Scientists, slime, and the reasons I teach history...

Scientists are an interesting lot. After spending 3 days with them (and 12 more to go) I have yet to put my finger on exactly why I'm uncomfortable.

No, it's not the slugs we needed to "caress" today in order to get them to produce slime so we could run an experiment (which is stickier, slug slime or glue from a glue stick?)



No, it's not the fact that we went to the herb garden and collected bugs irregardless of the impact it might have on insect biodiversity...



And no, it's not the obnoxious man who sits across from me and always interrupts the professors to tell his "interesting" story about his days as a wheat farmer, or about the Japanese man who ate crickets, or how his son, now a fisheries biologist, gave him a book on scientific Greek roots that the class might find helpful (sorry, no picture of said obnoxious guy).

Jeanne said it was their analytical nature, which is close, but more it's their "dry" view of the world. It's all about data and observation and collecting things and asking questions. I find myself, halfway through the day, asking again and again, "Now what do you want us to do with...?"...and you can fill in the blank with all sorts of topics...like today: "What do you want us to do with the crickets we just captured and smooshed under a petri dish?" Or "What do you want me to do with this large grasshopper lying dead and smelly on the paper towel in front of me?"

And they really have no answer. They just keep plopping larvae and pupa and crayfish in front of us and then wonder around the room saying, "Isn't science fun?"

At one point, one of the professors walked by where I started to draw the dead grasshopper in my notebook out of boredom and she said, "Oh, drawing them, that's a good idea?"

Ya think?

The class is interesting in that, as primarily a teacher who focuses on the humanities, it's nice to be exposed to bugs and slugs and the world of science, but on the other hand, I find myself far more interested in the names of the herbs we walked through at the Univeristy herb garden and the history behind those names than the actually capturing of bugs that will die, get skewered with a pin, and sit in a pretty box the professors have provided for us so we can have a insect box in our classrooms.

And another odd thing about science teachers is that they don't really talk...well, except for the obnoxious guy across from me who won't shut up. Actually, they talk, but it didn't seem to go beyond the deeper meanings of observation or edification.

Professor: A good friend of mine goes down to the rainforests in the Amazon and collects bugs.

Student: How does he collect them?

Professor: Oh, it's fascinating work. He spreads out huge mesh nets along the bottom of this enormous tree, sprays the tree with DDT and the bugs fall into his net by the thousands. And most of them have never been catalogued.

Class: Ohhhh, ahhhh, wow.

Me (thinking quietly to myself): DDT? What else falls out of the tree? What if that was the last colony of a particular bug that no one's every seen before? What about the birds?

Me (not so quietly to my neighbor): Why do we need to catalogue them all?

Neighbor: Oh, it's so important...we make such amazing medical discoveries. A cure for cancer might be in those trees.

Me (quietly to myself): Why is it all about us? What if we, humanity, are the key to finding a cure for the end of destruction for all rare and exotic bugs? What if the cure for eliminating invasive species is eliminating the worst invasive species on the planet, us?

And to think...there's a big old picture of Rachel Carson stapled to the wall of the classroom.

So, on our mini-field trip to the herb garden, I snapped photos of the herbs,didn't write down a single name of the plants, captured three insects and then released them when class got out.



Oh, and in case you were wondering, slug slime, in our clinical trials, was stronger than glue stick glue.

Thank god nature won that contest!

Lily of the Pad Part II

Okay, the image finally loaded solving the minor mystery...twas the website that struggled with the photos.




These photos are, of course, lily pads found in the Arboretum on Lake Washington. Our task as inquisitive scientists was to scrape the underside of the pad for "life" of which we found plenty. My favorite micro-organism was the "voxvol" ... a round transluscent sphere with four green dots (much like a beach ball). The sphere is made up of thousands of individual cells with tiny flaggelates for swimmers. They all work together to make the sphere literally roll along like a beach ball rolling on the ground. Of course, they aren't on the ground, they are in the water.

Also interesting are the teachers with whom I am taking the class. The course is billed as "science for non-science teachers" but after introductions, I realized I am the only non-science teacher in the classroom. Having attended most workshops with humanities types, it's strange to be in a room of science teachers. There is far less talking going on and the conversations are about science kits, the dreaded state test (called the WASL), and lack of funding. At one point, I had to leave the lunch conversation because the complaining was reaching a frenzy.

Not that I don't think public school teachers don't have anything to complain about, but I'd rather be a student looking at lily pads and beaver dams (see below) than a teacher who has to teach to a test.

Lily of the Pad

Despite the hot weather, I've been sitting in a 92 degree classroom learning about LIFE SCIENCES (yes, in capital letters!). We've planted lentils, created experiments, built plankton nets, and this morning, we actually got out of the classroom to paddle the lake in canoes (using our newly constructed plankton nets).

Since I get just "get out" and take photos like Fossilguy, I took my camera today to shoot some random pictures from the canoe...unfortunately, they aren't loading and I can't figure out if it's my pictures, the website, or some other cosmic screwy thing.

Anyway, I got some nice shots of lily pads, of all things, though I wish now I'd taken a picture of my face when I realized that the critter I had on my finger (before putting it into the speciman bag) was a leech. Eeewwww. I never realized we had leeches in Lake Washington. Makes swimming in it all the more interesting.

Too bad the lilly pad can't support MY weight...of course, that IS where I found the leech, on the underbelly of the lilly pad.

I'll keep working on the Lilly of the Pad shots...any suggestions, FG?

Pride Love

We were going to pass on the Pride Parade this year...too many people, too much waiting, too many dykes with cranky babies, gay churches, and not enough protest. We were going to spend a quiet day at our house working on one project or another...

...until we learned that our dear friend, Ms. Love was going to be one of the two Grand Marshalls of the parade...then we just had to go...

We got up this morning, had our coffee/cocoa and breakfast, then jumped on our bikes (to avoid the parking hassles and the crowds) and rode "gayly" down Jackson to 4th, then up 4th through the parade folks standing in the 85 degree heat waiting for the parade to start. It was a perfect way to really see the parade, but the diamond of the whole event was Ms. Love in her tiara as she sat perched on the back of a silver Mazada Miata waving proudly at the onlookers...



...we're so proud of our Ms. Love. She truly does good work as a health educator for the schools...setting up gay-straight alliances throughout the high schools and providing kids with access to important "queer" information. Everyone knows her in town...we really can't go anywhere without Ms. Love being spotted and hugged and squeezed.

But today, high atop her festive car, she was in her element...We're proud to call you our friend, Ms. Love (and Jeanne, her partner, too!)



Of course, once we snapped these pictures, we hopped back on our bikes and went the long route home in the hot, hot sun. Perfect way to do the pride parade.

House of Edibles

When I was in college, I collected the names of all the different places in town that started with "House of..." I don't know what happened to that list, but some of my favorites were "House of Hair" and the "House of Microwaves." I always pictured these houses filled with hair or radiating with waves so small that you had to wear special glasses to see them.

Now, as we continue on the finishing work of our house, we've created our own "House Of..." As we select colors to paint our accent walls, we've noticed a pattern.

First, we painted the kitchen accent wall CHAI. Then we selected the color for the bedroom accent wall, which is CAFE LATTE. Here I am painting said wall after Ann trimmed the 11 foot ceilings on our new ladder...



The other colors we've selected are TEMPURA, CUMIN, and we lovingly refer to the color our contractor sprayed every wall as MILKSHAKE or VANILLA. He, in fact, is referred to as Mr. Vanilla. So now our house is the HOUSE OF EDIBLES and despite the fact that we've chosen two other colors (Brownstone and Melodic), I feel compelled to keep choosing colors that have exotic edible names.



The last corners of CAFE LATTE...thank god for roller extensions! When did my hair get so gray?

The organics of gift giving

At the end of every school year, Ann and I compare our "thank you" gifts from our students. When I taught public school the comparison looked like this:

Ann
REI Dome Tent
$250 Pottery Barn gift certificate
$100 Bookstore gift certificate
New Overhead projector
$150 gift certificate to Wild Ginger

Gretchen
Scented candle
"Best Teacher" coffee mug
Hershey's Chocolate Bar
Hershey's Chocolate with almonds
Scented Candle set

While Ann teaches at a public school, she teaches in the gifted program, which caters to the wealthiest families despite the school's attempts to attract a more diverse population.

Now that I teach in a private school the comparison on my side has changed a bit. This year I received $100 gift certificate to REI, a fountain pen with my initials on it, a basketball (we play every recess, so it was a great gift), a $25 gift certificate to Starbuck's, and 3 scented candles, though they were purchased not at the local drugstore, but at Pottery Barn and Crate and Barrel.

The best gift, though, was 6 summer orders of organic fruit delivered right to my door every 2 weeks. We received the first delivery yesterday afternoon. A fruit box filled with plums, necatrines, peaches, a mango, strawberries, and bananas sat on the front step when we arrived home. We made a fruit salad for dinner that I ate again for breakfast. If we want, we can go online and change the order to fruits and vegetables, or just vegetables. The delivery comes with recipe ideas and information on how to live more organically...driving your car less, composting, and ways to recycle.



The family who gave me the gift also gave me a huge package of environmentally friendly toilet paper and tissues as well as a roll of duct tape.

Practical. Useful. Perfect.

Of course, after eating all that fruit, I know what the TP is for...

Still, I find the act of gift-giving at the end of the year an interesting case study in the sociology of schools and the psychology of my students and their families.

For instance, there are students who I know have very little money (especially after the whopping tuition costs, scholarship or not) and give these amazing gifts...gift certificates mostly, but still they are for sizeable amounts of money...money I know the families don't have.

Then, there are students who don't give any gifts...not even a card. That's fine with me. I don't count the days to the end of the school year because I know gifts will arrive, but I do find it curious WHICH students don't give anything, even a kind word.

One such student is a girl we weren't certain would stay at our school. After insisting that the girl be tested for a learning disability, the results came to us at the end of the year. Where I assumed something like asperger's, the results diagnosed a new "processing challenge" that I can't even remember the name of...which actually sounded a lot like asperger's. The result is that the student struggles (mightly) with any abstract thinking, preferring linear, patterned work like worksheets, memorization, or single-answer questions. While we do some work with memorizing, we rarely handout worksheets or short-answer, chapter driven assignments. Needless to stay, the student struggled throughout the year. Despite our multiple offers to help her after school during Homework Center, she rarely asked for help, rarely stayed after school, and never used a tutor to help her with her assignments.

The mother was hostile, angry, and distant from the beginning of the year and with our request for testing, never really did warm up to us until the very end of the year when we insisted on a meeting to discuss whether or not our school was the best school for her daughter.

It was not a surprise that a gift or a card never arrived.

But then there's the other student whose family makes tons of money, who we spent more than our fair share of time with counseling her academically, behaviorally, and socially, and never once was there a thank you let alone gave a card or gift.

Organic values...whole foods, whole child. There are fundamental values some families practice and other families don't. I have yet to figure out the pattern of which families are thoughtful and which families are too overwhelmed or self-involved to actually acknowledge others around them. There's no pattern in terms of money, there's no pattern in terms of race or religion or even sexual orientation. It's just this randomness; the chaos theory of socio-economics.

Next year, I think I'll make a predictions half-way through the year as to who will give a gift and who won't; who will give the big-ticket items and who will give me one more candle or mug or cheap chocolate bar.

For now I shall enjoy my delivery of fresh fruit, play some basketball, and go to the Starbuck's up the street...(I've already used the REI money for a new pair of shoes and lightweight jacket!)...and write my thank you cards to those families.

I'm okay Mom and Dad...really...

Having not slept well since school let out for vacation last Friday, I took one of those generic PM pills (like Tylenol PM or Excedrin PM) because I could feel myself getting grumpy and lazy and laconic and one should not be any of those things on vacation...well, except maybe lazy, but by choice, not as a reaction to insomnia.

And I slept. Hard. My dreams were amazingly complicated. I woke up at one point and thought to myself, "You should remember this dream" because it was comical and colorful and satisfying. I didn't remember it, of course, partly because of the heavy sleep, but partly because we were rattled from our beds by the sound of 4 loud and fast gunshots at 3:30.

(Don't worry Mom and Dad, we're fine...)

I jumped out of bed, ran to the phone and called 911 before Ann even understood what was happening. The shots were close, like right at the end of the block close and since we've been on Neighborhood Watch with the dodgy characters who live in the tan house at the end of the block that we can see from our new kitchen window, I knew close was just one house away.

When the police dispatch officer asked for my address, I realized then I was shaking, not so much out of fear, more due to the fact that I was in such a deep sleep the gunshots were more like ice cold water on my belly than frightening. Ann and I watched out our bedroom window as the police arrived (rather quickly) and then proceeded to investigate a car that (I learned this morning) had been shot at, the stray bullets landing on our other neighbor's porch who live next door to the tan house of thugs.

Everyone is fine, no one was hurt...that we know of...but it made it hard to fall back asleep as we listened to police radios and car engines and camera shutters document the report.

We appear to be in the middle of a turf war between rival drug gangs...the usual crips and bloods, but also another group like the Dominion or the Lords or the Diciples (I can never remember their names)...are fighting over the Central District. There are a lot of blue shirts huddled at the park and then red shirts by the small neighborhood grocery, and now white shirts hanging out at the tan house down the street.

Everything feels a bit desperate. As the gentrification of the neighborhood continues with the most recent influx of "urban pioneers" the gangs are increasing their visibility and more acts of violence have followed. More and more drug houses are being shut down, torn down in fact, and townhomes are being built lickty-split in their place. It's as if the gangs are making one last stand on who will control the neighborhood, but they just keep shooting at each other (at this point), which seems a bit misguided and short-sighted.

I doubt, though, that any of them are planning their 40th birthday parties or dreaming about kids and a nice house.

Despite the activity last night (actually early this morning) I did fall back to sleep and once again dove into dreamworld only this time I remember my dream...

I was hiking with a bunch of students and staff from school. I had on a backpack heavy with my school computer, my digital camera containing all sorts of school pictures, and mountains of papers I needed to grade. I was hiking along a narrow trail, bushes up to my armpits so that I had to carry my arms above my head so I didn't get scraped. I was stressed, walking a fast pace not because I wanted to, but because I had to. People were behind me and as I forged through the underbrush I heard someone yell, "Watch out!" I looked down just as I stepped off a ledge and plunged into a muddy, cold lake backpack and all.

And I kept falling down, neverending, weighted down with my life's work strapped onto my back. At that moment, I realized I was in a dream. "This doesn't happen in real life," I told myself. "Lakes have bottoms and I'm a good swimmer. This is a dream." Every anxiety I felt in that dream vanished. I was no longer in a panic that I would drown, that I would never hit the bottom so that I could push myself back up. I was no longer burdened by the responsibility of all the people following me, of all the work to do and still undone in my pack. "This is a dream," I kept saying to myself and then I tried to breathe. Cool air filled my lungs. "Of course I can breathe underwater...I can do anything in a dream."

And that's when it hit me..."Let go of the backpack!" I wriggled out of it and heard myself laugh as I watched it float down into the darkness of the bottomless lake. "This is it," I told myself. "No more dreams about school. I'm letting it all go."

When the alarm went off, I hit snooze 3 times before Ann said, "I still have to go to school today, I better get up."

So we got up, drank our hot beverages, ate some cereal, checked out the damage to the shot out car and then I drove Ann into work for her last day of school. Despite our early morning 911 emergency, I feel better today -- more rested, more relaxed, and less driven to get "things done" that I feel should be done right away.

I don't know what to make of it all -- the gunshots, the dreams and even the crow that slammed into Ann's head while she was taking out the garbage this morning (protecting her nest, I think, but hard to say) -- but today is distinctly better than yesterday and for now, that's all that matters...

The woman from work

I pass by your
apartment
every
day
I've been in that
apartment
A studio
12 feet long
6 feet wide
with
a little kitchen off
to the
side
I can't imagine
living there
You got a deal
you say
You say
because the building
plumbing comes
through your apartment
your rent is
reduced
You are a martyr
I see it
every
day
A victim
Even now
during
summer vacation
you are at school
doing
work
though there is
no work to do
Your classroom
is
bigger
than your apartment
so in some ways
I don't blame you
I could not
live like a monk
or a nun
or a prisoner
I could not
live like you
You have chosen
this
I know
You went to Harvard
You were studying
to be
a doctor
It was expected
Your sisters
are all
sucessful
you are just
a teacher
who lives in an
apartment
with only a small
bed
on the floor
one chair
and six silk
pillows
one small
window
facing the busy street
where I walk by
You were engaged to
be married
A nice man
Handsome
Successful
Just like you
were going to be
And then
he killed himself
a week before
the wedding
and now you live alone
and dress in men's
clothes one day
then a tight
skinny black
dress with high
heels the next
At night
You eat take out
or walk down
the street
to Chinatown
to eat at your
favorite Korean
restaurant
Kim chee
and barequed pork
and fermented
soybean paste
a bowl
of rice
You are not happy
you told me
every
day
in one way
or another
but then one day
you told me you
were taking
anti-depressants
you hugged me then
you never
hug
anyone
and I smelled
the cigarettes you
secretly smoke
and the Lysol
you spray yourself
with to hide
that you
are sad
and smoking
and living
in an apartment
like a monk,
or a nun,
or a prisoner
When I walk
by
I wonder
are you in there?
Are you looking out
right now through
your one small window
hugging one of your
six silk pillows
smoking? Listening to
the rattle of the pipes
from the man
who lives above
you in his
two bedroom apartment
with a view
of the city
and the water
just beyond?
Are you?

I pass by
your apartment
every day
And I cannot
help but think
of your
tiny space
your medication
scattered on the
kitchen counter
next to your
cigarettes
and Lysol can
and your keys to
school
I see you
lying on the
bed resting
on the carpeted
floor
I see you
sinking
shriveling
under the
weight of
your choices
your black dress
lying on top
of your suit and tie
like lovers
and I walk by
just then
and wonder

A Bowl of Cherries

We went to the store today to stock our cupboards and cherries were on sale for $6.99 a pound. I love cherries. I used to sit in my babysitter's cherry tree and eat them until my belly ached. Ann saw me eyeing them and said, "We have a cherry tree at home, love." So I passed on the cherries.

When we got home, I prepared Oaxaca Tacos from Cafe Flora's cookbook (thanks mom!) and lost all track of the cherries. Ann was outside working in the yard (though we don't really have one, but still, she's good at putzing when it comes to yardwork). Just as I was assembling the tacos, Ann walked in with this bowl...



This is so like her. There are times when I swear the girl never hears what I'm saying and then other times when I feel like she's taking detailed notes. This was such a time.

She balances me. I can get my knickers in a wad, as I did today, feeling overwhelmed by all there is to do. I think I'm still in teacher mode because when I woke up today I felt rushed, always watching the clock to see how much time had passed, how much I'd gotten done in the hour. At one point Ann said, "Hey, aren't you on vacation?" Only then did I sneak upstairs for a 20 minute nap.

Still, it's hard to unwind from the year, to get into the rhythm of unscheduled days, of not paying attention to the time, of letting go the responsibility of 22 little lives.

Case in point, I'm still having school dreams. Not dreams about school, per se, but dreams where I know I have to go to work and can't get my body out of bed, or can't find my underwear, or can't find any clothes. Dreams where I walk so slowly I know I'll be hours late for work, worried out of my mind that the kids will be alone, that they'll tear the classroom apart. And when I finally get there, it's almost the end of the day and I'm naked and angry and paralyzed.

Last night I dreamt awful things about my students. They were hurt and I couldn't rescue them. They were kidnapped when I was responsible for them. They were poisoned by cookies I'd fed them.

These are dreams I usually have at the beginning of the year when the anxiety of getting back into the teaching groove sends electric impulses throughout my veins. I've never had dreams like this at the end of the year.

"Aren't you on vacation?"

Today, it appeared that I was not.

Then, at the end of the day, when I felt like I hadn't made a dent in my list of chores and was busily cleaning the toilets, mopping the floors, and sweeping under the furniture Ann says, "We really got a lot done today!"

I'm thinking, "We did?" But that's the balance part -- I look at what's left on the list; she looks at what gets crossed off.

I put away my dust rag and mop and marveled at all we'd accomplished.

Today, life is a bowl of cherries (I'll try not to think about all the ones that are still on the tree!).

Perhaps the worry dreams will take a vacation, too!

Crow Ballet

We fell asleep the other night to a chorus of crows bouncing on the branches of our cherry tree. They bobbed and jumped and spat their threats from the top to the tree to the bottom of that tree. Not one single crow was eating any of the now exquisitely rippened cherries. Instead, they were all posturing -- flapping wings, hopping sideways, angrily dipping their heads and narrowing their eyes. We thought sunset would silence them, but the light dimmed and their cacaphony intensified. We tried to sleep, but the black noise was deafening at times, we sat up in bed and watched the silhouetted flutter of madness.

I thought of those crows again yesterday afternoon when I went to the ballet to watch one of my students perform. It was a whole different world. The audience was filled with family members dressed to the nines all carrying flowers -- roses, carnations, tigerlilies. Camera's flashed, skinny children posed with proud fathers and grandparents, and mothers fussed with bows and ribbons, rouge and eyeliner.

Once the performance started, hundreds of children from ages 3-18 flooded the stage dressed in tights and leotards. Every girl had her hair pulled tight in a perfect bun; every boy walked a little taller their family jewels suspended vulnerably.

And they danced. Wave after wave of fluttering child swept across the stage, arms extended, heads held high, plastic smiles on their faces.

As the afternoon progressed, the dancers improved -- each new level of "class" raised the bar of poise and expectation.

My student, A., danced in two numbers. First with her level (3 A) and then in the final number, "A Midsummer Night's Dream" where the highest level of students performed. They were magnificent. They leapt higher, their backs straighter, their hands held with just the right angle of suspension. A. was magnificent as well. At 11, she was one of the youngest dancers in the final performance, leading the bugs across the stage around the Bug King.

But through it all, I was so sad and uncomfortable. It began with the first chubby girl in tights and deepened when the next chubby girl fell flat in the middle of the stage.

Ballet is cruel, I thought. What evils of our society have worked their way in me that I feel pity for such children, just knowing they are the brunt of secret criticism, silent judgment; gossip delivered through the nod of a head, the narrowing of the eyes. The fat crows.

What psychological damage was done to the chubby girl who fell in front of an audience of 3000 adoring family and friends? At what point will the teachers not advance her to the next level, cancelling her out not because of her abilities, but because she hasn't grown lean and bony; because she now has breasts large, round, and heavy? She is womanly and beautiful, but not a dancer -- doll-like and slender.

There were chubby boys, too, but throughout the performance, the boys received the loudest applause, the wildest cheers even though, just like the crows of the night before, they merely hopped and marched and scurried from one side of the stage to the other. Except for the one boy, the Bug King, the featured dancer of the final performance. He could leap. He could flutter his feet beneath him with every spring. He could spin and stretch and fly like no one else.

All the rest were crows defending their positions, establishing themeselves as the ones to watch, hoping to be like the Bug King -- able to eat his cherries effortlessly.

Survival of the fittest. Darwin's ballet. The black noise of madness.

The realities of moving in

The kitchen is beautiful. The master bathroom is wonderful. The master bedroom is spacious and light. The floors throughout the house are glorious. The 6 foot bathtub exactly what my 5'9" frame needs. All the new windows that give us light, light and more light are spectacular.

But then there are the realities of moving in.

Our old bedroom has become the "second" bedroom that we plan to use as a guest room...soon...like next weekend when friends from Port Townsend come over for the Gay Pride Parade and then in July when Ann's sister and kids come to visit and then in August when Jeanne and Lisa come to stay with us for awhile during their own remodeling vagabond days.

But this is what the room looks like now. It is a dumping ground for all that we are working on, all that we need to work on, and all the left over detritus of our lives that has yet to find a home.

I'm not complaining. In fact, I'm ready to shovel through it this weekend NOW THAT I'M OFFICIALLY ON VACATION! That and paint the master bedroom and perhaps the other accent wall in the kitchen. Then, in a week, I begin a 3-week course in Life Sciences for non-science teachers. It's free. It gives me 7 credits (which I need to keep my teaching certification). And it sounds interesting. I'm trying not to think about the fact that during my vacation I'll be in class learning about Cane Toads and participating in squid dissections. Though we do take numerous field trips, so I'm not trapped indoors the whole time.

Ann will be off at the end of next week and she's all excited about caulking windows and spackling nail holes and sanding and painting and dumping 8 yards of topsoil on the backyard. You go, girl, I say. I plan to do all the painting after class and help buy plants and dig the holes and go shopping for things we need like a dining room table (no need for one in our previous 6 x 6 foot kitchen) and bookshelves and window treatments and rugs and blah, blah, blah.

It's a good thing the course I'm taking is free since all of our money is now going elsewhere...well, back into the house.

We should watch that movie, The Money Pit, again. HA!

And then we'll get away when we can, to the mountains of course, perhaps the ocean, if we have time, or maybe just to the backyard if we get it planted before the end of summer and we have to go back to work. The advantage of public school (where Ann teaches) is that she doesn't have to head back into her classroom until the end of August. In my private school gig, I'm back at in August 7. Doesn't give me a lot of time to breathe and relax, but I'm going to give it my best shot.

But first...the sorting and throwing away and organizing of the room of our lives...flotsam and jetsam are us!

Green, Gray, and Cherry

The cherries were finally still tonight, despite the strong wind that blew most of today. I rode my bike to Mary's, who cuts my hair, and the swirling wind provided a headwind coming and going.


Right now, the breeze is fairly gentle, but the gray clouds are still holding their water for awhile. The cherries, meanwhile, are growing in their red juiciness and we can't reach a one. Alas.

I finished the kid part of the school year yesterday with our last excursion to the beach and then a potluck/picnic on Alki's sandy shores. I still have to report for duty the rest of the week and I can tell you, no one is happy about it. We have "assignments" once we finish our report cards, which include things like clearing our floors so the janitor can polish and wax them, load up the school ibrary for its move to another building, and yes, even scrub the toilets. After yet another break-in, it appears we've fired our janitor because he was supposedly "linked" to the robberies. Sans janitor, we must fill in though why we are moving everything off the floor for a waxing without a janitor is beyond me.

I certainly hope they don't ask me to wax the floors!

Yes, this is why they pay us the big bucks!

And we even do windows!

So everyone, including me, was in a grumpy mood today. My teaching partner and I bumped heads at the end of the day and I'm trying hard not to feel too bad about it. No one wants to be there and no one wants to be there to do the work of someone else.

Part of our list of "to dos" contains the item that just burns me -- we are to help two other teachers who are moving classrooms pack up and move! Wait a minute...no one EVER helped me move in 20 years of teaching!

Not to sound bitter, but it's rather irritating to be called in to schlep boxes when we're SUPPOSED TO BE ON VACATION!

I shall try not to be so grumpy tomorrow. I shall try to meditate on the cherries for awhile. I shall try to be helpful and positive (my mantra), I shall try to be helpful and positive, I shall try.

Promises, Promises

So, I think this has worked...our house...southside view. Trees are in full leaf so it's hard to see the front, but here it is...in it's glorious done-ness...though not quite done, really. There are still walls to paint, trim to finish, furniture to buy, and a mortgage to pay. But it's ours, all ours (and the bank's, too) and every morning we look up from our perch in the kitchen at the light through the large windows and marvel that we live in such a wonderful place. Ahhhhhh...

As promised...

My Internet connection is slow. I guess that's what happens when it's a free ride off someone else's wireless. But I shall attempt to post pictures of our "new" house...

...okay, so that didn't work...I'll have to make the attempt from school tomorrow where the connection is stronger, though still free...part of my wonderful teaching benefits! HA!

So, let me write about the sky as that is the glorious view I have out my bedroom window when propped up in bed on the second floor trying to access the free wireless of some neighbor.

As this morning, it is gray though now there is wind. The cherry tree, with its green leaves and ripening cherries, is swaying in the breeze. But this is not a gentle breeze. It's a taunting breeze. The color of the clouds to the east is threatening, ominously stretching their greyness across a darkening sky. The air smells of rain and lightning, heavy with the promise of thunder and splattering rain. And just as I write the last line, the sound of pelting drops thread their way through the leaves of the rustling cherry tree, hammering the shingles of my new roof.

When I was a child, my parents would drive 4 days straight to Iowa City where my father would continue to work on his perpetually unfinished doctoral thesis. I remember little of Iowa City, but I do remember the thunderstorms, the hot lightning storms that rattled me out of my bed late at night and the way I raced in uncertainty and panic in search of reassurance.

Our family house sat in different houses each summer. There is one house that I associate with the thunderstorms, though the details are difficult to quantify into words. I remember a marble staircase or perhaps just marble railings. Regardless, there was marble and a granduer to the stairs. Sweeping. My bedroom was at the top of those stairs, just to the left of a small hall. I remember gray and white and black streaks swirling on the floor as I raced from my bedroom in barefeet, my blood pulsing from the white light shattered across the night sky.

It was hard to sleep after such an alarming awakening. I'd hide under my covers for awhile, but retreat to the humid air of summer when I felt the oxygen levels underneath the comforter dangerously drop. My eyes shut tight, I could still see the flash across the room and like Haley Mills in the Swiss Family Robinson, high atop her tree of safety, I'd count -- One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand -- marking the miles between me and a bolt of sudden death.

Years later, working on my master's thesis, I spent an evening in the computer lab while all of my classmates went out drinking. I was in Baltimore. The humidity had been oppressive for days. The lightning threatened all evening, but around 10, just when I was packing to head back to the dorm, the thunder grew in intensity and fired like cannons in rapid succession.

Just as I started to run from one building half a mile to the next, buckets of water poured from the light show above me. In just 5 minutes, I was wet everywhere. My underwear just as soaked as my shoes. It was during that run that I remembered Iowa and all the lost and foggy memories; ghosts of uncertainty whispering from the past. It was during that soaking that I knew I would write my thesis on my relationship with my father. When I got back to my room and changed into dry clothes, I sat down at my computer and typed the first letter to my father. The letters would later serve as my transitions between my father's story of mental illness and my own.

So now, when nights like this promise a storm, I no longer run for comfort. I see them more as inspiration -- of cooler temperatures, of dampening earth, of cleansing and redemption.

The rain has stopped for now, though the breeze is still angry and sporadic. The sky changes in shades of gray and as night falls the young men who sit on the porch at the end of the block thunder in the streets, their chests puffed, their baseball bats cocked to the left, their voices taunting and angry as the wind.

The Last Monday

There's a hint of rain in the air today. Slate gray clouds move slowly to the east. The crows are quiet and so is the wind. From our new bedroom we can't see much but sky and the top of our cherry tree where the cherries are reddening and the birds and squirrels are feasting. If we had a long rake or hook, we could grab a branch and feast ourselves. By the time the cherries are ripe enough for human consumption though, they'll all be eaten by one critter or another. I love watching the squirrels hang upside-down, their tails wrapped on a thread of a branch, their little noses and hands working away at a cherry bouncing up and down with the weight of the critter.

Today is my last Monday of teaching. I am so ready for it. I'm tired. Slept like the dead this weekend. Rain will do us good. Wet down the excitement of summer vacation. The girls will be less likely to act like fools.

And so will I.

The best questions...

So, we're back. I'm exhausted, but home. Nothing like a field trip with 20 girls at an old army barracks.

Not many highlights, though I knew we were a "different" school when I looked at our chaperones...3 lesbian moms, a rich white dad, and our African American secretary (from school). Combined (with my teaching partner and me) we comprised a wonderful movie title..."4 lesbians, a white man, and a soul sista"...we could never figure out how to fit my teaching partner in (white woman who's married to a man)...

And then last night, before lights out, one of my favorites asks, "Can you tell me what these words mean?" So, I look in her book (teenage level) and it says "phone sex." Umm, I think, how do I explain this and the girl says, "Don't laugh at me, okay? And don't tell me you have to tell my mom...she knows I'm reading this book already."

Okay, so I put on my best teacher's face and I say, "Well, you know how women sell their bodies to men who want sex, right? (Though that's not very correct, but...) And she says, "Yeah, like prostitutes." "Yeah, well, it's the same thing only men pay women to talk to them on the phone in a sexual way while the man masturbates." And she says, "That's stupid. It sounds kind of boring." "Yes, well..." was my only response. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized, she's right, it is kind of boring in a way. Well, from a kid's perspective it is.

Then, in the morning, she calls me over and says, "What's ecstasy?" And I say, "With an 'x'?" "No." "Oh, well, did this word come after the phone sex?" "Yes." "Well, you know what an orgasm is right?" "Yeah." "Well, it's how people describe that feeling when they have an orgasm." And she looks at me with this big question mark on her face and says, "But does that mean it's a good feeling or a bad one?"

Oh...what fun.

I'm just glad I get to sleep in my own bed again. World War II barracks aren't good for middle-aged back!

Only 2 school days left...whew!

Weak signal

I wanted to upload a picture of one of the horses we worked with last Friday, but the connection to the wireless I'm freeloading off of is very weak tonight and is moving very slowly. I think this is only fitting as my connection to whatever drives me feels a bit weak tonight as well.

The good news: I'm typing this at our new butcher block 8 foot kitchen island. It's beautiful...promise, pictures coming as soon as I'm up and running on my own cable service.

Other good news: There are chocolate chip cookies baking in our fabulous new oven.

Now for the exhaustion: We head to our remote island...me, my teaching partner and now about 19 kids as one has opted out of going (well, her evil mother has), the other came down with strep (second time in a month...she apparently got it from reusing the same toothbrush...go figure) and the other was home sick today hoping to recover from something not quite finished in her system. Two out of the three are a great loss to the trip. Evil mother child is free to stay home in my opinion as the fruit doesn't fall far from the tree and not having evil daughter of evil mother go makes our trip a lot easier and well, a lot safer. Long story.

But the other two, well, it will be a loss as they are kind and gentle and always engaged in whatever we're doing. Still, it wouldn't be a good end to the year if we all ended up with strep on our remote little island!

Oh, and our other set of exhausting events came in the form of one of our field trip drivers having to back out because her youngest daughter broke her arm...I mean broke as in had emergency surgery. Couldn't be helped, but we spent much of our day trying to figure out alternate drivers for the trip. All solved, but it took most of the day. Whew. Nothing like a mom with a van!

I want this trip to be over...it's going to be two nights of sleeping in barracks with young girls and a few chaperones. Kind of like Cider House Rules..."Good night all you kings of New England" or however that went.

Cross your fingers, though, the weather looks like it might be decent and when we get back there are only 2 days left of school! Yahoo! And I'd rather spend the last days of school outside than inside trying to give tests. Been there and done that and this is much nicer if a ton more work.

Hence, the chocolate chip cookies -- for the car ride and the ferry wait.

We're listening to Lizz Wright and soon the buzzer on the oven will sound. Then it's bedtime and rest before we shove off for our voyage. Peter Pan and Wendy...and the Lost Girls.

Flight plan

In our 7 months of remodeling and living any where but here, I've noticed some differences in how I live and how others live. Or should I say WHERE I live as opposed to WHERE others live.

First, we are in the path of all the flights that land at Sea-Tac airport. Big jets fly over about once every 3 minutes. They don't fly super low, but we hear them all the same. When we stayed at Doris and Steven's house, they rarely heard them at all. This, mind you, is about a mile from our house, if that, but over the rise of the big hill with all the ritzy houses on it. I'm not certain it has to do with much, I'm just sayin...you know, I'm just sayin. At one point, when we were all talking on the porch, I remember Steven pointing to a jet far off in the sky and saying, "Wow, they never get that close." I couldn't even hear the jet.

Second, there aren't as many cell phones in this 'hood as there are in others. Again, the places where we've stayed are pretty well off, wonder bread white, with meticulous lawns. There are cell phones in our neighborhood, but in the other neighborhoods where we stayed, it was as if every person had a cell phone taped to their ears (some actually did with that wonky ear piece thingy).

Third, in our neighborhood people look at you. In the other neighborhoods, people jumped back when we said hello or worse, didn't even acknowledge our kind warmth and kept on walking -- cell phone plastered to the side of their head.

Next, gas is cheaper, but grocery stores are dirtier. I can't find any decent produce on this side of the tracks, but the price for a head of lettuce is almost the same as the fancy, trendy grocery store in the other housesitting neighborhoods and their heads of lettuce are lush and green and gi-normous. I can't figure out why gas is cheaper in our neighborhood except that maybe in the richer neighborhoods people are willing to pay for and put in $50 worth of gas in their BMWs and Mercedes and Hummers while we would much prefer $30 of gas in our beat up LeBarons and LTDs. Hard to say.

Starbuck's and Tully's are much quietier atmospheres there than here. They also are "overstocked" with help. At the major Starbuck's up the street, 4 employees try to service at least 30 customers at a time while at the major Starbuck's "over there", 10 employees offered service to the same number with much greater efficiency. Ummmm. And the music over there is not nearly as loud as the music over here. Double ummmm.

There are more police here than there, but that's a recent phenomenon as the drug gangs are in a turf war here and the police "have made a commitment to keeping the CD safe from crime" though they aren't doing a very good job of it since the drug crime is just moving south and we live, well, south of the drug street and there's a ton more "drug" garbage around our house than there was 7 months ago when we left.

Still, I must say it's good to be home. Even with the rowdy neighbors and the opossum who slinked through our backyard the other morning and the jets overhead, we love our new house and are excited to work this summer on all the stuff that isn't quite finished. Luckily, we have the great hardware store (affordable, that is) in our 'hood while in the others there is either nothing or the trendy places that charge pentagon prices for screwdrivers and garbage pails.

Ann is right now installing screens in our windows and putzing in the back yard under the roar of yet another jet.

Still. It's nice here. It's home. (Pictures soon, I promise!)

Connection/Dis/Connection

3:20 a.m. Saturday morning -- our brand spankin new bedroom smoke detector goes off. I look up to the 11 foot ceiling and think "How the hell are we going to get up there? We don't have a ladder that tall!"

Luckily, the alarm stopped and we sat up in bed trying desperately to read the smallest print known to humankind on the alarm instructions. "3 Beeps - Pause - followed by 3 Beeps" means the thing is in TEST MODE. What a time to test yourself!

So we heard -- from our designer and my mother -- that sometimes spiders can walk across and set it off. Tonight we reached our feather duster up there to sweep away any spiders. I'm still worried that it will test itself again early in the morning.

But there's no time for sleeping as our new neighbors are having a party in their backyard, which is adjacent to ours. They are renting the house. Melvin, who usually lives there NEVER has parties. In fact, the onlly thing we hear from him is a bit of Aretha in the morning while he's shaving (we can hear is electric razor, too). Melvin's off in some foreign country and he's rented his house to the rowdiest, loudest woman I've met in a long time. She usally sits out on her back porch and talks on her cell phone incessantly in a voice that reminds me of Lucille Ball on speed. It's awful. It goes on and on all night long. Just as I'm certain this party will.

Unless they head to the Cowgirl Bar downtown. They seem like the Cowgirl Bar type. How's that for stereotyping! HA!

I am exhausted. I should be sleeping. I haven't had much sleep in quite a few days what with alarms and cowgirl parties and the thugs at the end of the block who stand in the middle of the street and challenge each other with chests and shouts.

And work has been none-too-easy either. Thursday I felt like Lucy from Charlie Brown -- I could have hung a shingle on a stand that said "Psychiatrist is In" and made a killing with 5 cent sessions. 4 girls got in trouble for writing a letter to another girl they thought was a bully only their letter was more bullish than the girl they were accusing. When we "punished" them, they all started sobbing uncontrollably (well, except one girl who truly is the BULLY) and I kept thinking, "Is this how the Salem Witch Trials got started?" Then the accused bully found out about it all and fell apart, as did her psychotic friend who wants ONLY to be friends with the accused bully and no one else (and she expects her friend to be exclusive to their friendship as well). Then I found out that the accused bully has confessed her thoughts of suicide to psycho girl so I had to spend an hour with accused bully and then another half hour with her mother and in that conversation, I learn that psycho girl is cutting on herself so I have to go back in "session" with her to find out if that's the case and spend another half hour on the phone talking to her mother.

Is it July yet?

My only solace this week (though it still required amazing energy) was our field trip to the Horse Whisperer (in Enumclaw) who uses her horses to teach the girls how to be effective leaders. That was fucking amazing. The girls loved it, the parents loved it, we loved it, and as far as I could tell, the horses loved it. Too much to explain, but it was exactly what we needed after our psycho-ward drama on Thursday.

Still, sleep would have been nice.

We came up to bed hoping that the party would end soon, but no such luck. More guests seem to be arriving as I type and I wouldn't be typing at all if I hadn't booted up my computer to download some pictures only to find that the internet connection I thought I no longer had access to I have access to...but only upstairs.

So, I checked email to find a message from Ann's sister about their psycho mother who has, according to sister, spent almost 10 grand on the Mexican convict. Sister asked Ann to call the mother, but Ann can't find her phone number admist our half-unpacked boxes and so she's decided that reading the DaVinci Code was far better use of her time than rescuing mom, yet again, from some manic relationship.

It has been a week of connection and disconnection in so many ways. Perhaps the biggest lesson I learned with the Horse Whisperer (and there were many) was that if you don't show your authentic emotions to a horse, they'll not give you the time of day. Not sure how to carry that into the rest of my life, but it seemed pretty amazing at the time...and very true as the girls who struggle with being themselves couldn't lead a single horse (to water) until the Horse Whisperer helped her "get real" as she demanded of the students. It was fucking amazing.

The party has reached a frenzy next door. It would all be okay except for this very drunk woman who screams a lot...like Lucille Ball on speed -- it's the kind of heterosexual ditziness I hate in some women.

Do men really think that's attractive?

Get real, I want to yell out the window!

Ann's idea is to hose them all down with water from our lofty perch of our new bedroom. "They'll think it's raining," she says. Yes, they are probably drunk enough to think it's raining, but I doubt they'll quiet down or go inside.

I could really use some sleep.