The Language of Life: Some Rambling Words for National Poetry Month

I have two degrees in English, a BA and an MA.

Yet I was late, very late, coming around to poetry. I think it's safe to say I never got completely comfortable with it until I had to teach it, and even then it took a while.

I'm not sure why. The wrong professors? The wrong poems? The wrong method of teaching (used on me)? The wrong method of teaching (used by me)?

I think it began with self-recrimination: I don't get it, I thought. I'm too stupid to get it. And more than a few professors did have a (I believe unintentional) bad habit of dismissing comments with a wave of the hand and saying, "no, that's not it." As a teacher, I try very hard to give most interpretations a fair hearing -- I'm a BIG believer in multiple interpretations. I try very hard not to wave the hand, but instead ask for further explanation. Sometimes I'm eventually convinced of the validity of the student's idea. Often, if the interpretation is way off base (I think that necklace is a symbol for a space alien), another student will chime in and help set her peer straight.

In fact, I think I've only come across one poem (not that I've read them all, not hardly) for which I would argue that truly, there's only one interpretation. Here it is:

Metaphors

I'm a riddle in nine syllables,
An elephant, a ponderous house,
A melon strolling on two tendrils.
O red fruit, ivory, fine timbers!
This loaf's big with its yeasty rising.
Money's new-minted in this fat purse.
I'm a means, a stage, a cow in calf.
I've eaten a bag of green apples,
Boarded the train there's no getting off.

Sylvia Plath

If it's not obvious to you right away, that's ok. Let me help. The poem has NINE lines. Each line has NINE syllables. Here are some of its images: elephant, ponderous house, melon, fruit, loaf...rising, new-minted in ... fat purse -- well, etc. Every line, all NINE of them. With NINE syllables. Did I mention the importance of NINE?

Yes, of course the poem is about pregnancy. Plath warns us right up front that it's a riddle, and riddles generally only have one right answer. And to argue it's about space aliens or famine or man's alienation in the post-modern era is -- well, stretching it.

However, most poems open their arms wide to allow readers their own intimacy with them. Just as each person's relationships with different people are different relationships, so is each poem's relationship different with different people. My favorite poem may be one on which you wrote the tenth grade paper that earned you your first D. Your favorite poem may remind me of a friend who betrayed me. I may see optimism in a poem that for you signifies the end of the world. I may think that red hat symbolizes courage, while you see shame. And there's a good, good chance we're both "right," which is a relative term anyway.

Prior to the Modern Brit Poetry graduate class that I unintentionally took (a story all of its own), poetry for me was mysteries and math: no, I have no idea what the teacher thinks this poem means, and is da-DAH an iamb or a trochee and why do I care again, exactly? In this class, however, we sat in a circle and discussed the poems! The students, as a group, talked more than the professor! Sometimes he admitted he didn't know how to pronounce a word, or what the poet might have meant by "peanut butter"! This might well have been the first time I was exposed to the idea of multiple meanings in poetry. Remember again that this was a graduate class!

Later, but not much later I'd guess, I stumbled upon Bill Moyers' series The Language of Life on PBS, and it, more than anything, changed my view of poetry. (Ever since, I've wanted to go to the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival, a biennial affair that should be on again this fall.) I found the show mid-series, and as far as I know, it has never run again. Too damn bad. I recorded the last few episodes, which are somewhere among my things and not very sharp. The rest I have never seen. Now and then (including just before I started this post), I Googled the series, but I don't see any "news." No hope that it'll be released on DVD or run on PBS again. Not yet. (Its entry on imdb.com has no message board! So sad! On the other hand, it's so very out of print...) I could, however, buy the VHS set from an entrepreneur on Amazon for $350.00 or more... I do, however, have the book and a few years ago bought the cassette set on eBay brand new for far less than Amazon sellers want for it now.

Anyway, this series, more than anything ever, made me see poetry as something dynamic. Poets read in intimate rooms with Moyers, under tents to crowds, in circles with students. Reading Jimmy Santiago Baca's poetry is one experience; hearing him read it is another experience entirely, another relationship.

So, way to go, Bill Moyers.

This post has gone on almost long enough, so I'll start wrapping it up. I did eventually figure out how to teach poetry, and very few students walk away unable to discuss on paper a poem of their choice (among my choices) with a reasonable level of intelligence. (Note I said nothing about writing skill, just thinking. Another matter entirely.)

And the point, which I'm finally getting to, is that here's the truth about poetry: a person's relationship with poetry is not an either/or proposition: we don't have merely two choices -- (a) like and "get" it all or (b) be a poetry neanderthal. We should give ourselves permission to have a different relationship with each poem. If we like a particular poem, we should like it. If we love a particular poem, we should love it. If we don't understand a particular poem, we should slow down and get to know it a little better. And if after a few tries things are just not working out, we should tell it goodbye and try another.

I'll end the rambling with one of Naomi Shihab Nye's best-known poems, one which works just fine as my own credo:

Famous
--Naomi Shihab Nye

The river is famous to the fish.

The loud voice is famous to silence,
which knew it would inherit the earth
before anybody said so.

The cat sleeping on the fence is famous to the birds
watching him from the birdhouse.

The tear is famous, briefly, to the cheek.

The idea you carry close to your bosom
is famous to your bosom.

The boot is famous to the earth,
more famous than the dress shoe,
which is famous only to floors.

The bent photograph is famous to the one who carries it
and not at all famous to the one who is pictured.

I want to be famous to shuffling men
who smile while crossing streets,
sticky children in grocery lines,
famous as the one who smiled back.

I want to be famous in the way a pulley is famous,
or a buttonhole, not because it did anything spectacular,
but because it never forgot what it could do.

Haiku: A Challenge Met

Sir Robin requests the pleasure of our haiku. If you write one, send it to him.

I went for "traditional" flavor first time out, invoking the season of the haiku's creation. I couldn't decide on punctuation, so this became three haiku. I wasn't sure what the plural is, but the Tubes seem to be in agreement that it's haiku.

Spring Haiku 1:
Spring brings a soft breeze
A backyard of red flowers
Yard work, endless, joy.

Spring Haiku 2:
Spring brings a soft breeze
A backyard of red flowers
Yard work, endless. Joy.

Spring Haiku 3:
Spring brings a soft breeze
A backyard of red flowers
Yard work. Endless joy.

Just Shoot Me Now

Because it's coming to that:

TALLAHASSEE, Florida - Most Florida residents would be allowed to take guns to work under a measure passed by Florida lawmakers on Wednesday.

The bill, allowing workers to keep guns in their cars for self-protection, was approved by the Florida Senate by a vote of 26-13. It now goes to Republican Gov. Charlie Crist to sign into law.

Backed by the National Rifle Association and some labor unions, the so-called "take-your-guns-to-work" measure would prohibit business owners from banning guns kept locked in motor vehicles on their private property.

The measure applies to employees, customers and those invited to the business establishment as long as they have a permit to carry the weapon.

Backers say the measure upholds the vision of the authors of the U.S. Constitution, who made the right to bear arms part of the Bill of Rights.

"The second thing they wrote about in that constitution was the right to bear arms," said Sen. Durell Peaden, a Republican from Crestview, Florida. "It was what was dear in their hearts."

Well, I had a few comments, but really, I'm rendered speechless.

I think I'll go run a few errands now while the likelihood of a shootout in the parking lot of the Ok Grocery Store is still somewhat unlikely.

Somewhere, Charlton Heston is smiling.

Water, Water Everywhere

Oops.

In Jacksonville, Florida, the local TV station ran a story about the city's plans to strictly enforce watering rules because as those who are paying attention know, water is in some places a scarce commodity and is headed toward that for the rest of us.

A city official explains the need for getting serious about water conservation:

"We want to hold off as long as we can and have our water supply last as long as possible as clean as possible," said Vincent Seibold with the city's Environmental Quality Division.

The online text story closes with a drop-down menu for viewers to peruse the top consumers of water in the county, both residential and commercial. Several prominent names appear under residential, including those of a head football coach and an owner of an upscale auto dealership. However, the most amusing name appears in the business section:

The City of Jacksonville.

Carl Sandburg, Redux, Or, Happy Poetry Month!

While I was visiting at Sir Robin's place, he reminded us all that this is National Poetry Month. I knew this. I just didn't actually acknowledge it, not even when I was teaching poetry, not even when I invited a poet to visit my classroom next week. Talk about being too close to the trees to see the forest...


This made me think about The Official Poet of Bitty's Back Porch, Carl Sandburg. It's not every blog that has an Official Poet, I don't suppose, but this one does. Because I am One Busy Person, I'm going to honor NPM for now by rerunning a Sandburg post. I've never rerun anything before, but Law & Order does it to great effect, so why not me, too? Here goes, from March 31, 2006:

Some weeks back, I waxed, um, poetic about Carl Sandburg, favorite son of our mutual natal state, Illinois. At the time, I bemoaned the cost of the used Complete Poems of Carl Sandburg as out of my reach.

Well.

I found a less expensive copy.

Over the past five years -- and only AFTER finishing my formal education, I might add -- I've come to appreciate poetry. For years it intimidated me, but once I realized the obvious, that it is ok not to like or understand it all, just as it is ok not to like or understand all prose, poetry and I became good friends.

Poetry must be read slowly, carefully. If not, one might as well be reading the back of a Tylenol bottle.

And so, a week or so ago, slowly grazing in my new/old Sandburg book, I confirmed two things:

(1) Lefties, Carl is for sure one of us.
(2) I can get overstimulated quickly by poetry. Reading too much Sandburg produces the same dazed mental state in me as eating too much canned icing.

I offer two Sandburg poems today because one just isn't enough. The first is a prose poem that shows us two things: although he worked mostly in traditional forms, Sandburg wasn't a slave to tradition. Secondly, plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

From Good Morning, America (originally copyrighted in 1928):

Implications

When the charge of election bribery was brought against an Illinois senator, he replied, "I read the Bible and believe it from cover to cover."

When his accusers specified five hundred dollars of corruption money was paid in a St. Louis hotel bathroom, his friends answered, "He is faithful to his wife and always kind to his children."

When he was ousted from the national senate and the doors of his bank were closed by government receivers and a grand jury indicted him, he took the vows of an old established church.

When a jury acquitted him of guilt as a bank wrecker, following the testimony of prominent citizens that he was an honest man, he issued a statement to the public for the newspapers, proclaiming he knew beforehand no jury would darken the future of an honest man with an unjust verdict.

The second poem, also from Good Morning, America, I'm rather certain I've read before, long ago:

Money, Politics, Love and Glory

Who put up that cage?
Who hung it up with bars, doors?
Why do those on the inside want to get out?
Why do those outside want to get in?
What is this crying inside and out all the time?
What is this endless, useless beating of baffled wings at these bars, doors, this cage?

Bette Blackout Blues

According to Mustang Bobby, via Shakesville, Turner Classic Movies is running a "Bette-athon" to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Bette Davis' birth.

So I read this and wonder why it is I never watch Turner Classic Movies. I like classic movies.

I go look and discover that I don't get it with my service. Bummer.

This is one of the things I really, really, really, really, really don't understand about cable/satellite TV. Really. One would think that the various networks would be frantic to be on the "expanded basic" (or whatever your individual provider calls it) and would push hard/make concessions to be on that "tier." After all, the more viewers, the more commercial revenue, yes? But to get some of the channels that the cool kids watch, like TCM and MSNBC, I have to pay an additional $10-$20/month. So I don't.

Some time back when Phil was talking about Sarah Richardson's shows being on Fine Living (I watched her when she was featured prominently on HGTV), I considered upgrading, but in the end I couldn't justify an additional expense to view two or three additional desired channels when I don't have time to watch the desired channels I already have. So while I can't see the Bette-athon, Rachel Maddow, or any one of a zillion cool things on the National Geographic channel, in the end I don't think it's me who gets hurt. It's the stations who are stuck behind a economic firewall between them and me.

Dateline 15,000 BC?

Newsflash! Women do more housework once they get married. And when they have kids, they do even more! It must be true if a study says so.

Having a husband creates an extra seven hours of housework each week for women, according to a new study. For men, tying the knot saves an hour of weekly chores.

"It's a well-known pattern," said lead researcher Frank Stafford, an economist at University of Michigan's Institute for Social Research. "Men tend to work more outside the home, while women take on more of the household labor."

He points out individual differences among households exist. But in general, marriage means more housework for women and less for men. "And the situation gets worse for women when they have children," Stafford said.

I'm speechless. Thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster that a brave scientist took on the task of finding this out for us and a brave news organization put its corporate neck on the line to report it!

Seriously, I know there are plenty of men who do their fair share of work around the house, whether that's painting and mowing or baking and cleaning. And some men are the primary house-tender. But for the majority of women, it didn't take a study to prove what most of us have experienced since the beginning of marriage. And it's even odder that this is being reported as breathlessly as if it's the newest idea since, oh, I don't know -- kids like candy?

Irony? Karma?

I don't think I was gloating in my very recent post on a brush with the law, but Karma has apparently paid me a visit anyway.*

I rather expect to get a ticket in the mail this week. Rats!

Here's what happened: my least-favorite driving scenario is to be in a left-hand turning lane with someone immediately facing me trying to left-turn in the other direction, a green light but no left-turn arrow, people behind me, and traffic maybe coming at me/maybe not because I can't see through the vehicle facing me. And lucky me -- I got into that scenario tonight.

I was inching into the left turn because I wasn't absolutely sure that the way was clear. Once I could see that no one was coming, I took off across the intersection. Only after I got halfway across did I realize that the light must have turned when I was busy watching the traffic because now cars were coming into the intersection from my left.

I was embarrassed. I try really hard to be both a careful driver, while at the same time not being a problem driver (meaning not being so overly cautious that I cause trouble). I try very hard not to make driving mistakes, and I never intentionally run a light. My kids make fun of me because I sometimes stop for yellow lights if I think I can't make it through. (No one does that, Mom!) Anyway, I pulled into the parking lot, shopped, and came out to the car. As I was lined up at the light to get out of the parking lot and back on to the main road I noticed something hovering over each set of lights: cameras. Cameras pointing at the intersection at every angle, including the one I'd been traveling.

The cameras are new to my county. They've only been in place a few months and aren't everywhere. This light has only been in place for about a month. This will be my first ticket ever for a moving violation.

My only hope is that the cameras were on the fritz tonight. But I don't suppose I can be lucky twice in one week.

Sympathetic comments would be greatly appreciated.




*When I do something good, why doesn't Karma reward me then? Why?

Fun With Demographics: another thing Wikipedia is good for

While I was making a comment on the Blue and Red Light Special post below, I did a quick search on the town of Waldo, Florida, a little bump in the road nationally famous for being a speed trap. I chose Wikipedia as my source and noticed that Wiki P. had quite a lot of demographic info posted for a town of 800, so I decided to check out my own Tiny Town. Since I'm not inclined to identify where I am, no links -- sorry. But I did learn lots of interesting stuff, based on the 2000 census (which means that the info is somewhat out of date, but still):

All by myself, I currently earn almost exactly the 2000 median income for families. Believe me, although I'm no longer destitute (have been in the past), I don't make a lot of scratch, so that's scary. In fact, while I currently make $22,000 more than the median income for women, in 2000, my income pretty much was the median income for women. I guess this explains why I'm able to pay my bills on time now!

In 2000, mine was one of the 10.3% female-headed households.

In 2000, 18.4% of households were non-families. Since that's such a high number, I wonder what that means. That is, of course we have the situations where platonic friends room together, but I'll bet that 18.4% includes a lot of same-sex couples and even hetero unmarried couples, both of whom probably see themselves as families, thank you very much. But the gubment doesn't. Perhaps they need to ask different questions on those census forms.

The most stunning thing to me, although I'm not sure why it stunned me, is that my town needs to be renamed Whiteyville: in 2000, 93% of us were white. Where I live is a subdivision in my town, which is cozied up against another, non-rural small town (from my mailbox I can look down the street and see mailboxes from this other town), which is next to a Big City. I live, in essence, in a bedroom community. This might be why my street defies the racial demographics of my town. For years it has been a little United Nations. Our cul-de-sac has seven houses. On the corner: white husband, white-hispanic wife (wife's recently deceased hispanic mother used to live there, too). Next to them: black family. Next to them: white husband, white wife. Next to them: white husband, Japanese wife. Next to them: white me. Next to me: white husband, white wife. Next to them, the other corner: black-hispanic husband, white-hispanic wife, hispanic kids. In other words, four out of seven homes are not just "white" or not white at all. So, yes, 93% surprised me. However, much of the rest of my small town actually covers a lot of unincorporated area and is extremely rural. I guess it makes sense that most of those folks living down those dirt roads, many of whom drive Confederate-flagged pickups, are white.

To put this in perspective, the Big City near my home, the place where I work, had a white population of just under 65% in 2000.

It'll be interesting to see what changes the 2010 census reports, but we'll all have to wait a while for that post.

Blue and Red Light Special

It's late: 11:30 pm. It's dark. I'm weary. Very weary. I'm on my way home from work. I'm on the long, winding road with the 35 mph speed limit.

Now, it's not that I don't like to drive fast, but I'm allergic to things that needlessly cost me money, like speeding tickets, so I tend to drive right at 5 mph over any posted speed limit, having bought into the folklore that the police won't bother me if I'm within that parameter.

Suddenly, aggressive blue and red flashing lights replace the darkness in my rearview mirror. I look down. 41. I'm guilty. This is it. My first speeding ticket. Ever. Where's the license? Did I ever put the new insurance card in the wallet? Will I ever find the registration in that rat's nest in the glove box?

I hit the turn signal and pull over, resigned to the increase in my insurance rates. Only then do I realize that a car was behind me, and it, trailed by the police car, passes me by. Both of them pull over just ahead of me.

I take a deep breath and pull back out on the winding road.

Tonight someone else got the blue and red light special, not me.

Oh, the places I won't go!

A good many things I'd like to blog, I don't. I have a fear that someday a family member will find the thing and then I'll have some 'splainin' to do.

Right now, for instance, there are a truckload of things I'd like to say about a certain person who needs to stop being so self-centered and controlling before it comes back to bite him or her, whichever the case may be, in the tush, as well as harm us all.

But for the sake of familial harmony, I'm keeping my mouth shut online and in person.

The best blog post I never wrote was about an event that I won't specifically allude to here and my enormous restraint throughout the event. Since this blog generally is not a place where I spill words to praise my own wonderfulness, I hope you will take my word for it when I say I was a saint in this situation.

Friend Alanna knows what I'm talking about and will vouch for me.

I'm dealing with a similar situation right now.

Sorry for being so frustratingly vague. Grrr!

Otherwise, I can't go there.

A Rose By Any Other Name

A few years ago, traveling on a local road I rarely travel, I passed by a beauty salon called Curl Up and Dye. I nearly ran off the road. Since then, I've heard of other, similar places with the same name. Morbid, I thought then, and morbid, I think now.

Tonight I spied a new sign on a local road I often travel: Eat Your Heart Out Catering.

Do people actually think before they name their shops, or are they just so proud of their own cleverness that they don't consider that potential clients might find their clever names ... sinister?

Unless your establishment is the Haunted Mansion at the Magic Kingdom, being cleverly sinister is not the best of ideas.

The Efficiency of UPS

On Monday I ordered two books from Amazon, one a friend's recently published book of poetry, and one Tobias Wolff's hot-off-the presses collection Our Story Begins: New and Selected Stories. I've been waiting for Wolff's book partly for its own self and partly so I could spend the minimum $25 required to get Free Shipping and get my friend's book. Yippee! (Adding to the happy savings: by "preordering" the Wolff book all of one day early, I got another discount.)

I don't know how Amazon makes shipping decisions, but I'm always just a little disappointed when the shipper of choice is USPS. It's not that they're slow, because they're not particularly, but their "track this shipment" information decidedly lacks information. Usually there's a cursory note -- something like "carrier notified to pick up package." And then there might not be another notation until after I've opened the package and am turning the pages of the book.

Not so with UPS, which o happy day Amazon chose this time. UPS practically offers the phases of the moon and the state of mind of the truck drivers. Here's the books' travel history:


March 27, 2008 04:00:00 PM BITTY'S TOWN FL US Delivered
March 27, 2008 08:18:00 AM BIG TOWN NEAR BITTY'S TOWN FL US Out for delivery
March 27, 2008 08:12:00 AM BIG TOWN NEAR BITTY'S TOWN FL US Departure Scan
March 27, 2008 06:28:00 AM BIG TOWN NEAR BITTY'S TOWN FL US Arrival Scan
March 27, 2008 03:11:00 AM ORLANDO FL US Departure Scan
March 26, 2008 06:27:00 PM ORLANDO FL US Arrival Scan
March 26, 2008 08:24:00 AM CHATTANOOGA TN US Departure Scan
March 26, 2008 04:04:00 AM CHATTANOOGA TN US Arrival Scan
March 25, 2008 11:43:00 PM NASHVILLE TN US Departure Scan
March 25, 2008 06:28:00 PM NASHVILLE TN US Shipment picked up from seller's facility
March 25, 2008 12:21:08 PM US Carrier notified to pick up package

I was up early this morning, so I got to watch the package move from its arrival in Big Town through all the moves except "delivered," which happened when I was not online. It's like watching a loved one run a relay race, or checking in periodically with the Tour de France. Go, go! You can do it!

Now the first part of the excitement is over, and I can move to the second part. I must publish post, shut down, and drive home so I can turn the pages of my new books.

Nobody Wants to Have a Damned Meeting!

I'm on a committee. Generally, I find it kind of a silly one, but that's neither here nor there. Today we were to hold our scheduled monthly meeting.

I fouled something up, so we weren't going to be able to do what we'd planned. I sent my apologies around, and I presumed that we'd conduct some other business.

Well.

The speed at which suggestions to cancel the meeting appeared in my mailbox stunned me.

I show up at these silly meetings, assuming that everyone else is all rah-rah.

But what's now clear is that nobody, not just me, wants to have a damned meeting!

I am well and truly Lost now: Lost Madness

A "friend" just told me about Lost Madness at the Washington Post:

During the NCAA Tournament, college basketball freaks get to advance their favorite teams through a series of brackets. Now, it’s the “Lost” fans’ turn.

Introducing “Lost” Madness, a two-week competition where readers can vote for their favorite “Lost” characters in 32 face-offs featuring 64 of the key players from the Oceanic 815 universe. By the time it’s all over, a champion – otherwise known as the best “Lost” character ever – will emerge.

I call her a "friend" because a real friend wouldn't feed in to my obsession. No, no.

More on this later as time permits.

(But seriously -- between Jack and Cindy, who did you think was going to win? And while Locke and Sayid go head-to-head next time, Kate's up against...Vincent?? I smell a fix.)

People visit my blog. Who knew? And some self-pity, too.

This is kind of a shock. I'm barely reading my own blog, and four people showed up today.

Thanks, guys.

I wasn't going to blog any more for a while. I really don't have time, but here goes anyway.

I find myself in an odd position of having to keep my mouth shut about how I feel about having my son leave to risk his life for an immoral rich man's misadventure.* I'm not being silenced by neocons, although living in the red section of my red state, that's often how I feel about other issues -- silenced. Instead, I feel muzzled by what I can only think to call my own sense of decency. Except for talking to my friends -- bloggy and face-to-face -- I have to hold my silence. And I'm holding my silence with the people that I'd most like to talk to.

Let's start with Daughter. She's the most likely person I would talk to about such things, but this is her brother we're talking about. She's at least as invested in this as I am. Worse, her husband leaves for Afghanistan in a few months. So when we speak of this, I only say about a tenth of what I'm thinking.

Then there's Tall Son. Again, it's his brother, and it would be unfair of me to dump on him.

Then there's Indian Princess, Marine Son's wife, pregnant and with a not-quite-five-month-old at home. Enough said.

Mostly importantly, I have to remain silent with Marine Son. I'll be talking to him this weekend (by phone -- we're on opposite coasts). I have to say goodbye to him -- knowing that it might really be goodbye. (Of course, this is theoretically true of every goodbye, but usually we're not seeing people off on their trip into a circle of hell.) In such a conversation, it's not good form to express fury at the waste of it all. Not good form to complain. Not good form to say what I really want to say, which is I am terrified you won't come back -- or won't come back the same person. I am terrified you won't get to raise your children, you who have waited your entire adult life to have a child who could live with you. I am terrified for your younger children -- that they might never know you. I am terrified that you, who are one of the funniest, cleverest, noblest, most loving people I have known, will not

---it took me three minutes to type this word --

survive.

Anyway, that's a conversation I'm not allowed to indulge in. I know there are many people who do, but I can't be one of them. Except with a few friends. And except here.

What makes me uncomfortable is that this situation forces me to be dishonest, to be someone other than who I am.

But for the sake of other people's feelings, that's how it has to be.








*and if someone wanders in here and lectures me about the dangerous world we live in, that we have real enemies, etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. -- I know that. I am referring to our vanity war, which has done nothing whatsoever to mitigate those problems.

The Other Shoe Drops

So I've been having a good cry all afternoon, and I don't think it's going to end anytime soon.

I've known it was coming, but not quite when until this afternoon.

My son leaves for Iraq on Monday.

In Which Bitty Ponders Becoming a Hollywood Producer

In an e-mail exchange with a friend today, we were commiserating with one another about the difficulty of getting students to interact with Shakespeare.

They whine that they can't understand the language, so they can't read it.

They whine that they can't follow what's going on in film versions, so they can't watch it.

Yet the Danes/DiCaprio Romeo & Juliet of a few years back did well enough. Methinks it's all about casting.

Friend suggested that Johnny Depp, because he's popular with our crowd, should do a Shakespearean tragedy, whereupon I hit on the idea of financing it through the contributions of grateful English teachers.

I figure ten bucks from each of us should be enough to get Depp and a high-quality cast and director, as well as finance the other costs.

Yeah, there are that many of us and we're that desperate.

Honor Thy President

Driving by the day care my now-adult children once attended long, long ago, I saw a sign.

First, I should mention that "message signs" have long bugged me. I hate having signs nagging at me, telling me what to do, what to think, who to be. I once attended a warm, loving church. Then the pastor died of cancer, new people came in, and the day I knew the place had changed utterly was the day the message sign quit making announcements (Spaghetti dinner at 7 Wednesday) and started scolding me (Think it's hot here?). Yes, message signs make me break out in hives.

So, I'm driving by our former day care in this red, red state, and I see on the message sign what looks on first blush like an innocuous message:

Honor all our Presidents.

I suspect that if the owner had italicized letters, that "all" would have been in italics.

I got the sermon, Ms. Daycare.

As a person who likes to exercise the "freedoms" that our current White House resident is so fond of speechifying about, I particularly enjoy my freedom to think. So far this is not a crime. And I think that anyone who wants to receive honor must first act honorably.

My Valentine's Gift

For Valentine's Day, I got a call from Marine Son and Indian Princess.

Their baby #2 (his #3; my grandchild #5) will be making his or her appearance around my birthday in October.

I dare anyone to beat that!

(I think I need to open a Christmas club. I now know why people do that.)

A Good Day

Definition of a good day:

1. The semi-official end of the workweek (I actually work 7 days a week, and I have a meeting tomorrow, but no more classes this week).

2. Payday.

3. New episode of Lost in 2 hours, 50 minutes.

Check, check, and check.

This is officially a good day.

Crazy: A Meme

Tagged by Waveflux, I’m doing this little book meme, but I’m not sure how cool my response is. And what's a meme -- nay, what's a blog? -- if it's uncool. Nevertheless, here I go. Here are the instructions:

1. Grab the nearest book (that is at least 123 pages long).
2. Open to p. 123.
3. Go down to the 5th sentence.
4. Type in the following 3 sentences.
5. Tag five people.

The genuinely nearest book is one I love, The Pocket Muse: Endless Inspiration, by Monica Wood. However, since it is an inspirational book, many of its pages contain only a sentence or two. This is true of page 123. It has no fifth sentence, nor does it have a sixth, seventh, or eighth. It has only one. Here it is:

Write about an immigrant who refuses to be noble, humble, or dignified – from the point of view of her husband.

Cool -- and I need to get right on that -- but not really fitting the rules.

So I reached for the next nearest book, The Vintage Anthology of Contemporary American Short Stories, edited by The Genius Tobias Wolff. My offering this time is short and, well, short:

Crazy.

“Swell,” he said. “Terrific.”

It’s from a classic short story, but I won’t say which one right now. I dare the two and a half readers of this blog to throw out a guess without Googling it.

(Hints: Contemporary American Short Stories. Short, terse, sentences. Edited by Tobias Wolff, who has friends in the bid-ness.)

Without the dare, I don’t know how interesting my part of the meme is. Even with the dare…eh.

Since I’ve already flunked the meme once and eh’d it a second time, why start worrying about the rules now? I’ll just tag one person: kaat.

Four-Word Review of Lost, Season 4, So Far

More questions than answers.

(This is NOT a complaint!)

Constructed beauty

Today Tall Son sent this photo of his current job. He loves the tilt panel construction best. He wants me to see the building.

However, I see shadow, reflection, pattern, and glorious blue.

My Inner Prufrock

I didn't see this coming, although I have to sorta kinda agree with the narrative that justifies this choice -- especially about the "hopeless effort of people trying to impress other people..."

I guess I should go back and read that poem that most people despise.

You're Prufrock and Other Observations!

by T.S. Eliot

Though you are very short and often overshadowed, your voice is poetic
and lyrical. Dark and brooding, you see the world as a hopeless effort of people trying
to impress other people. Though you make reference to almost everything, you've really
heard enough about Michelangelo. You measure out your life with coffee spoons.


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

Hat tip to Melissa, whom I am not trying to impress. ;)

The Opposite of Identity Theft

I've just spent almost an hour writing a letter, making copies, making a trip to the post office, etc. for a creditor who INSISTS on getting my name wrong in its records. I have called to no avail. I was assured my name was corrected, but I'm still getting a tidal wave of paperwork in the wrong name. Now the creditor wants me to initiate automatic deductions from my bank account. How, pray tell, can I do that when my bank account is in my actual name, and the creditor's records -- and the form it wants me to use -- is in the fantasy name???? (The name is not actually a fantasy, but a despised maiden name that I have not used for over 36 years and only give to people when I must provide my maiden name. It has many bad associations for me, which makes this process not only irritating and time-wasting, but really, really upsetting.)

This is the opposite of identity theft; I'm having an identity foisted on me that I don't want.

Now I know at least in a small way how those people must feel who are prematurely declared dead by Social Security, etc. and whose cries of but I'm still alive! are ignored.

Well, Now I'm Kinda Sorry the Golden Globes Got Cancelled

...since my just-about-favoritest show, Mad Men, and the maddest man of all, Jon Hamm, won their awards.

(And yes, despite my lingering absence, I'm still around. Whatever that means.)

Happy Holidays!

I'm off to California to meet my youngest grandson. Have a splendid holiday season!

400 Days

Only 400 days left of the Bush Administration.

Only 400 days left to send billions upon billions of dollars into the economic sinkhole that is Iraq.

Only 400 days left to send countless soldiers to one of four fates: death, physical injury, PTSD, home well and in one piece.

Only 400 days left to wage war on Iran.

Only 400 days left to wage the war on terror just as the Three Stooges would. (That is, if Larry punches ya, ignore him and hit Curly...)

Only 400 days left to drag-foot on positive environmental policies.

Only 400 days left to further tarnish our reputation on the world stage.

Only 400 days left to push an energy policy that does little to nothing to implement ideas and technology that would help decrease consumption while simutaneously blaming consumers for consuming.

Only 400 days left to pad the bank accounts of energy executives and war profiteers.

Only 400 days left to push the ineffective strategy of abstinence-only sex ed.

Only 400 days left to advocate for the fetus while abandoning the infant.

Only 400 days left to pretend our country is doing something productive for those areas damaged by Katrina.

Only 400 days left.

If on day 401 we aren't looking forward to significant and positive change on all these issues and more, there simply is no hope for us.

Splotchy's Story Meme

Tagged by konagod, I herewith keep Splotchy's Story Meme alive and well. To quote kona, "Each tagged person needs to add to the story and then tag others. Them's the rules and I don't make 'em." I backtracked to Splotchy and discovered a request that we link to those who go before us. Well, that makes sense. So I did.

I hereby tag Phil, Kaat, Madame X, and Maya's Granny.

(And even if I haven't officially tagged you, if you drop in and read this, please do pick up on the meme. It's a hoot!)

Now, on with the story:

I woke up hungry. I pulled my bedroom curtain to the side and looked out on a hazy morning. I dragged myself into the kitchen, in search of something to eat. I reached for a jar of applesauce sitting next to the sink, and found it very cold to the touch. I opened the jar and realized it was frozen. (Splotchy)

I was used to the house being quite cold in the mornings, as the night log usually burns out around one AM when I am dreaming cozily under my covers, not normally waking to put a new one on until morning. I was surprised because on the rare occasions that it actually had reached sub-freezing temperatures in the house, I had awakened in the night to restart the fire. I would have been worried about the pipes before P-Day, but there hadn’t been running water in two years and that was one of the few advantages to being dependent on rainwater, no pipes. (Freida Bee)

The nightmares began during the following spring. The apple trees came to life in my dreams. At first the trees spoke and I thought they were amusing. That changed when the messages arrived. Lately, their anger was directed at me. (mathman6293)

I turned and stared out the kitchen window, past the frosty-lidded cistern to the orchard beyond. My trees, my beautiful fruit trees, stood leafless and dark. I wished with all my heart that this was just a normal winter thing, but it wasn’t.

"Why are you blaming me, guys? You know I love you. You watched me go out and vote that last time, in the ice-storm. It’s not like I didn’t try!”

I turned with a sigh and went to the phone to give Zaius a call. Perhaps The Good Doctor had made some incremental progress on his Long-Shot-Theory. (TCR)

Unfortunately, the phone was dead. Not from the inclement frigid weather, but because I didn't pay the phone bill and my service was shut off. "Oh well, I'll use the cell phone," I said aloud to no one but myself. As fate would have it, the cell phone battery was completely drained. I never even heard the thing chirping during the night to remind me to charge it. Being somewhat annoyed by all this, I went back to the kitchen, grabbed an ice pick and began chipping away at the rock-solid apple sauce when suddenly there was a very loud knock on my door which startled me. (kona)

In my surprise, I dropped the applesauce; no one but me had been on the property since Cordelia had died, not even Zaius. The frozen jar smashed into my big toe, which was inadequately protected by a worn green handknit slipper, one of Cordelia’s last gifts to me. Blood gushed from the crushed digit as the knocking escalated into insistent pounding. I moved from room to room in a frenzy, limping yet rushing, knocking over stacks of books and papers, blood documenting my every move. Where were my glasses? I had to have my glasses to see out the peephole. It hadn’t been prudent to fling open a door in welcome since the Winter Cleansings of 2018, just after the internet was shut down. Where did I put them? Just as I spotted the spectacles beside the fireplace, the pounding stopped, replaced by a most inhuman howl. (Bitty)

Merry Christmas from the Afterlife

A few months ago, my almost-13-year-old grandson told me his great-grandmother (mother's mother's mother) had recently died. At least, that's what I thought he told me. I'm not on unfriendly terms with his mother (who is not my son's wife), but we don't chat regularly, either, so I hadn't heard this news.

I confirmed this info to be true with Marine Son, First Grandson's father.

I'd meant to send belated condolence letters/cards to FG's mother and her mother -- dead grandmother was a nice lady and I'd liked her -- but I hadn't got around to it.

Imagine, though, my surprise this week when I received a Christmas card from said dead grandmother.

The stick-on return address label showed just her husband's name, but I immediately recognized the handwriting that had penned my name and address as the same hand I'd been seeing for the 12 years the couple had been sending me cards. My initial reaction was that the great-grandfather had been writing out the Christmas cards all these years and I just hadn't known it until now.

Then I opened the card and found it signed Him and Her.

Signed Him, the widower. Signed Her, the deceased.

I decided that I must have not been paying close attention when First Grandson and Marine Son both told me about the death. I thought it must have been First Grandson's grandfather's mother.

I was, gotta say, freaked out, but also embarrassed that I'd made such a mistake. And I was oh so grateful that I hadn't sent the condolence cards.

However, tonight I decided to double-check. Marine Son is away from home doing training and I certainly wasn't going to call First Grandson or his mom. So I went to the net, plugged in the appropriate info, and...

discovered that the kind lady who sent me the Christmas card did indeed die in July.

Either it really is the husband who's been writing out the cards all these years and he simply can't let go of her, or she was one of those hyper-organized types who wrote them out well in advance and her husband decided to mail them anyway.

In any event, I feel deeply uncomfortable about this.

But I put the card out with the others anyway.

Merry Christmas, Him and Her.

Friends

On the phone today with Daughter’s Littlest, who will be 3½ any day now, and who started preschool in September:

Bitty: Do you like your school?
Littlest: I have lots of friends.
Bitty: What are their names?
Littlest: I don’t know. (Aside) Mommy, what are their names?

Clever

Tall Son sent this video this morning. I think he sent it mostly because he could; that is, he just bought an iPhone and he sent it through the phone. Tall Son is a marketer's dream: he has probably owned at least 25 different cell phones since portable phones were first invented. His first looked like the radios in the war movies. Now that he's purchased the iPhone, I'm left wondering what took him so long. Me, I'm on my third phone. I gave the first away to a domestic violence program and the second one broke.

However, Tall Son's patriotic spending habits are not the point of this post. The clever video is. It interests me on two levels: these guys clearly spent a lot of time practicing this routine since the camera never cuts away. One little goof and they'd have to start over. I'd like to know how many takes it took to get it right. The other thing? It reminds me of Les Miz and its circular stage. I have students doing a presentation on the movie version of the play next week, and after that I'll be watching Les Miz myself as I evaluate their efforts.

I'll try not to think of treadmills as I watch it.

Dilemma

So I'm being asked at work to do an important, labor-intensive job. There's something in it for me, but I suspect that "something" won't be worth it. Instead, I'll likely have 8 months of time-management hell trying to get it all done.

I want to be helpful, but at the same time, I have REPEATEDLY gotten myself into tasks that involve a lot of work and a little thanks. One nearly sent me to the looney bin.

In other words, yes, Bitty is a doormat.

You would think I would know better by now.

I do know better.

And I'll probably still agree to do it.

Mais oui....!

How unsurprised am I by this?

Personal to Alanna: you should do this. I'd love to see what it comes up with!

Your Inner European is French!

Smart and sophisticated. You have the best of everything - at least, *you* think so.

Who's Your Inner European?

Found at Shakesville.

Turkey Float

I didn't know for sure that I was cooking Thanksgiving dinner until just recently, so I didn't get my turkey until Monday evening. It's ginormous, and the turkey websites advise a 4 to 5 day thaw for a ginormous bird.

I don't have 4 to 5 days.

Plan B advises thawing in cold water. And I quote:

You may also place the wrapped turkey in the sink and cover it completely with cold water for about 30 minutes per pound.

No, I may not.

Sounds like a plan, but (a) I have the shallowest sink in the western world, and (b) when I attempted to immerse the bird in water in a plastic bin, I discovered...it floats. How am I to "cover completely" a turkey that floats? I may be a mere English major, but even I know that no amount of water will cover something that persists in bobbing on the surface. All I can think of is putting a weight on it.

Now where did I leave that brick?



Update: I tried placing a big, heavy bowl on top of the turkey, but the bird shoved the bowl aside and stubbornly rose to the top. I wondered if David Letterman ever tried to make a turkey float, but I found no results.

This Week in Post Secret

We use LOL a lot here on the internet, but I really don't LOL all that often.

But I sure did today after visiting Post Secret:



Except in my case, I live in fear of something slightly less dramatic. A mere robbery or kidnapping, perhaps. Then, God help me, I'd be alive to face Griss and Cat. Because, fear or not, my house doesn't get cleaned nearly often enough.

The Name Game

I dropped in on one of my favorite reads, Maya's Granny, and found the name meme. I did something like this a while back on someone's blog with my real name, but I think I'm going to stick to my blog name, Bitty Sue, with "Sue" operating as both middle and last name. Let's see what happens:

1. YOUR ROCK STAR NAME: (first pet & first car) - Taffy Datsun

2. YOUR GANGSTA NAME: (fave ice cream flavor, favorite cookie) - Butter Pecan Oatmeal (doesn't sound very gangsta if you ask me!).

3. YOUR “FLY Guy/Girl” NAME: (first initial of first name, first three letters of your last name) - B Sue (well, that was no fun)

4. YOUR DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal) - Periwinkle Cat

5. YOUR STAR WARS NAME: (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 letters of your first) - Suebi

6. SUPERHERO NAME: (”The” + 2nd favorite color, favorite drink) - The Sage Pepsi

7. NASCAR NAME: (the first names of your grandfathers) - Ralph David

8. TV WEATHER ANCHOR NAME: (Your 5th grade teacher’s last name, a major city that starts with the same letter) - Hendricks Houston

9. SPY NAME: (your favorite season/holiday, favorite flower) - Spring Gardenia

10. CARTOON NAME: (favorite fruit, article of clothing you’re wearing right now + “ie” or “y”) - Banana Slacksy

11. HIPPY NAME: (What you ate for breakfast, your favorite tree) - English Muffin Maple

12. YOUR ROCKSTAR TOUR NAME: (”The” + Your fave hobby/craft, fave weather element + “Tour”) - The Reading Lightning Tour

13. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born) - Sue Chicago

14. WITNESS PROTECTION NAME: (mother’s & father’s middle names ) Josephine Unknown

I think this at very least proves that I have no business being a gangsta, but I might make a great soap opera character or weather anchor...

Feel free to join in, in comments if you are without blog.

In which Bitty gets one inflammatory forwarded e-mail too many

Not As Faraway Daughter (she's not as far away as she used to be) forwarded this e-mail to me recently.

How can this be!!Mom & DadMom was a homemaker and Dad worked all his life and paid into SS.Dad has passed away and now Mom can barely make ends meet. While thepossible "illegal" alien in front of her at the grocery store buys thename brands, Mom goes for the generic brands, and day old breads.She doesn't have out of state calling on her phone, because she can'tAfford it and shops at the thrift shops and dollar stores. Sheconsiders having a pizza delivered once a week "eating out". She grewup during the depression, watched her husband go overseas to fight inWW II a year after their marriage, and then they went on to raise, feedand clothe 5 children, struggling to pay tuition for parochial schools.The Senate voted this week to allow "illegal" aliens access to SocialSecurity benefits. I'm sorry, but how can the Senate justify this slapin the face to born and bred, or naturalized citizens. It is alreadyimpossible to live on Social Security alone. If they give benefits to"illegal" aliens who have never contributed, where does that leave usthat have paid into Social Security all our working lives?Attached is an opportunity to sign a petition that requires citizenshipfor eligibility to receive Social services. If you do not wish to signthe petition yourself, please forward on to anyone you think might beinterested.PETITION FOR: President Bush Mr. President: The petition below is aprotest against the recent vote of the senate which was to allowillegal aliens access to our social security! We demand that you andall congressional representatives require citizenship for anyone to beeligible for social services in the United States .

This gem was followed by 670 names, the last one being my daughter's.

(Before I get started on my rant, I question the wisdom of sending your full name, city, and state of residence around the web. That was in my third reply to Daughter.)

The day she sent this, I sent out a first reply, letting her know that when I had time, I had a few things to say about this. Here, then, was my second reply to her:

Dear Daughter,

I still don't have time to fully address this, but I never will and need to move on. Here are two things on it:

http://www.snopes.com/politics/immigration/petition.asp

http://www.snopes.com/politics/immigration/socialsecurity.asp

This petition and things like it irritate me for two reasons:

1. The probable intent is to inflame its readers, to make them angry. In this case, its intent is to intensify anti-immigrant, esp. anti-"brown people" attitudes. People read this and when governors or Congress or Presidential candidates try to deal in whatever way with immigration issues, they remember how pissed off they are about those social security benefits and how "the government" is trying to give away the store. What the e-mail DOESN'T do is accurately describe the issue and just serves to make people even more ignorant and reactionary than they already are. Look at how many people signed it without bothering to confirm if it's true or not!!!! This is true of ALL of these kinds of e-mails, which generally stretch the truth to appeal to people's prejudices and fears.

2. As I said, it's inaccurate. The 2nd link above addresses this in more detail than I had intended, but the bottom line is this: NO ONE gets Social Security benefits without paying in.

By the way, my first paying job was with Social Security. I worked in the department that handled claims by foreign citizens. That's right. We've been paying Social Security bennies to foreign people forever. Since the beginning of Social Security, I presume. In these cases, they were legal workers, but they were aliens.

Let's go for a number 3. It's this kind of crap thinking by Americans that makes my job harder; I spend all kinds of time trying to undo pre-formed opinions, a/k/a prejudice.

Don't assume that just because someone said it, it's true. Don't assume that just because it comes in an e-mail it's true.

Don't think with your emotions. Think with your brain.

Love,
Mom

I spend all kinds of time trying to educate my children, too, apparently.

It's possible that this e-mail was begun by someone who half-heard, half-understood what it was that Congress did and went off on a tear.

It's just as possible that this e-mail was begun by a sly political operative who wanted to further poison the anti-immigrant attitudes in our country.

It only takes one of these outrageous stories, true or not, to get people angry and then motivate them to vote according to misinformation.

Don't assume that just because someone said it, it's true. Don't assume that just because it comes in an e-mail it's true.

Don't think with your emotions. Think with your brain.

________________________________________________________

Post script: At least 13 years ago, I took a Culture Wars class. I had no idea how engaged I would be in those wars later. Anyway, the professor, 13 years ago, said that there's always talk about how Social Security is going broke, and that it would intensify as the boomers reached retirement age. He said that we will eventually fix it the way we've always fixed Social Security problems: invite a large influx of foreign workers into the country to increase the level of contributions to the fund.

5309

The cashier rings up the groceries.

I slide my check card through the black plastic card reader.

The cashier says, "Your total is $53.09."*

The black plastic card reader asks for my PIN.

I stand there, confused. Disoriented.

Something's wrong, and I'm not sure what.

PIN? PIN? This is an easy question. Why am I unsure of the answer?

I look at the total on the screen. $53.09.*

The confusion clears. My PIN is 5309.* My total is $53.09.*

For a heartbeat, my financial universe is in alignment.



*Like me, my PIN has a pseudonym.

Baby, It's Cold Outside

42

I realize that for many around the country, 42 degrees at this time of year is a heat wave. However, this is our first night with weather like this. The sky is clear; thanks to the falling back property of Daylight Saving Time, I get an extra hour of life tonight; my heat works; and I have warm jammies, fresh sheets, and a good book:

(Ann Patchett: who I want to be when I grow up.)

Life is good.

Random amusing photo

I was going through some pictures, and I came across this one. It's the house next door to where, until recently, my great-aunt lived. It's not something I'd expect to see in my suburban Florida neighborhood, and so I took the photo, but in rural Illinois, I don't suppose it's so surprising to see corn growing in a gutter that's past its scheduled cleaning.

(Click on the photo to embiggen and better see the corn.)

Snurg, Piffle, Burst!

Found at the blog of the delightful Maya's Granny, and so suited to the blog of an English teacher that I just had to make a home for it here.

A rose by any other name...

Those ubiquitous stickers on the back windshields of family SUVs with an outline of a sports figure and a name: they scream "Mama of a Baseball/Football/Soccer, etc. Player on Board."

I had to pass the SUV and get a good look at that mama this morning, because I wanted a firm picture of what kind of woman names her child Anakin. (However, this mama was either a grandmama or she'd been living a seriously rough life.)

Some of the baby name sites that offer meanings and origins of names take the name Anakin seriously and attribute it to George Lucas, yadda yadda. The site I linked to above says it means "warrior." Whatever. Other say "no results," as it should be. I tried checking to see what it might mean to name a baby Chewbacca. Surprisingly, no results.

As I clicked along from link to link, I arrived at the Social Security Administration's baby name site, a site in some ways more interesting than others because it has the weight of a really good set of statistics behind it. (Anakin does not make SSA's top 1000; that's as far as SSA's statistics run.)

I gave up the search for Anakin and had fun playing with the SSA's site for a while.

Clicking on "Popular Names by Birth Year" and limiting myself mostly to the top 20, I see that the year Marine Son was born, his name was #1. I knew this well before today, but at the time of his birth, I only knew a few people by that name and thought it was quite unusual and lovely. Ha!

The year Tall Son was born, his name was ranked #16. There goes Bitty being all cutting edge again.

The year Not As Far Away Daughter was born, her name was #5. (Both the year of TS's birth and D's, all three of my children's names made the top 20 list.)

The year of my birth indeed reads like my high school yearbook. Whatever happened to Barbara, Brenda, and Cynthia anyway? And why don't people name their daughters Linda any more? Yet I was a bit surprised to see that the year I was born, my own non-Bitty name was #10. I don't know many people by that name, but those I do are all indeed around my age (give or take 10 years). Apparently we were really hot for a short while. However, had I been named Mary, I'd have been #1. (Between Marine Son's and Tall Son's births, Mary dropped out of the top 20 after a very, very long run at the top.) Interestingly, the year my mother was born, in the early 30's, Mary was number 1 and my mother's name, like mine during my birth year, was #10.

The year Grammie was born, in the early nineteen teens, Mary was still flying high at #1, not imagining a day when she'd be bumped from that honor. Grammie didn't make the top 20 list (she made the top 100), but her name was in the top 20 for some years when her own mother was a child.

My children have been more successful at thumbing their noses at trends. None of my four (count 'em, 4!) grandsons made the top 20 lists for the years of their births, although Grandson #1's name is currently in the top 20, and Baby A, born recently, may be at the beginning of a trend, since Indian Princess reported that several babies in the nursery received the same name that he did.

Most of my current students are 18 or 19, and sure enough -- I've griped about this before -- the top three girls' names in both 1989 and 1990 and in the same order both years were Jessica, Ashley, and Brittany. In fact, looking at the top 20 lists for both girls and boys for those years is pretty much like looking inside my gradebook.

I will probably retire in 2022 or 2023, unless they make me do it earlier. That last year, the young men in the classroom, who are now in the sandbox with my daughter's youngest son, will sport names very similar to those I see now. But when it comes to girls, I can expect to face a classroom sparse on Brittanys and instead, except for an abundance of Madisons, full of girls who sound like they should be Grammie's classmates: Emily, Emma, Abigail, Olivia, Isabella, Hannah, Ava, Grace, and Chloe.

And not an Anakin in sight.

Birthday Buddies. Or not.

CNN’s candidate profiles offer a surprising bit of information.

Hillary Rodham Clinton was born on October 26, 1947 in Chicago, Illinois.

Dennis Kucinich was born on October 26, 1947 in Chicago, Illinois.

Except that it doesn’t seem to be true. Other sources indicate that Kucinich was born on October 8, 1947 (in Cleveland).

A leading news outlet making an error? I’m stunned.

(I'm also bummed because I was considering the astrological consequences of two presidential candidates having exactly the same birthdate and place. Oh well.)

Deprivation

This I know:

There are not nearly enough orange Tootsie Roll Pops per bag of Tootsie Roll Pops.

Happy Halloween!

Thursdays are Lonely Without You

Spoiler alert: If you haven't seen the final episode of Mad Men or you haven't seen any of it but plan to watch in rerun, don't read this post!

Last night I had that odd feeling that something was off, the feeling we get when perhaps we've forgotten to brush our teeth or lock the door or turn off the stove.

Or watch Mad Men.

Sadly, there's no Mad Men to watch. At least not until the reruns begin or summer 2008 gets here: the season ended last Thursday.

Wandering around the 'net, I've found a few brouhahas (0r might the plural also be brouhaha?) about Peggy's "surprise" pregnancy.

Surprise? Raise your hand if it hadn't crossed your mind. Uh-huh. That's what I thought.

For some, it wasn't the pregnancy but the fact that Peggy herself didn't seem to recognize she was with child.

TV Guide had a thread running on this; I don't know quite where it is now and don't really feel like looking it up, but for every two people who screamed implausible! Mad Men has already jumped the shark! was at least one who had a story like the two I'm about to tell.

In 1971 I worked with a woman who told me the story of her first pregnancy: she had no idea until she went into labor. She'd always had irregular periods and continued to spot during the pregnancy. She didn't gain much weight and hadn't begun to attribute it to a possible pregnancy. How did she account for all the wiggling in the belly? That I don't remember. She gave birth to a full-term child.

This one I can directly verify. Ten years ago last month my 14-year-old niece gave birth at home. Until the child arrived, her mother (my sister) had almost no idea, nor did anyone else in the family. C looked a little chunky (as did Peggy) but not nine months pregnant and my sister had even asked her once if she was pregnant. The girl denied it. In this case, it apparently wasn't full denial on the pregnant girl's part, but denial regarding dealing with it. C's doctor told my sister that these invisible pregnancies aren't all that uncommon when the pregnant girl/woman has a strong reason to deny that it's happening. The mind is an interesting, interesting thing. C's daughter A was full term and healthy despite no prenatal care, and today is a sassy, active ten year old.

In Peggy's case, she was living in an era when women just didn't know much about their bodies. She'd obtained birth control pills, but we all remember just how helpful her doctor was, don't we? And (going on fuzzy memory) I believe Peggy first slept with Pete within days of obtaining her pills.* (We are all assuming it's Pete's child, yes? If it's not, that would be jumping the shark.) Having been given no real information, Pegs probably thought those pills were magically protecting her, not knowing that they take some time to fully kick in. Recall her insistence that it was impossible.

More evidence that not only is Peggy's denial real but that her unknown-to-her pregnancy is not some impossible event: a nurse rather quickly says she'll call psych, as if this is a common occurrence.

Next summer seems so far off...

*Reading the episode 1 synopsis on the show's website, it appears it was the same day, although there's no mention whatsoever here of Peggy's actual visit to the gynocologist. Odd, since the synopsis is quite detailed otherwise.

In which Bitty gets a guest-starring role at her tied-for-favorite blog

The other day Waveflux (Phil) made some pertinent comments about the relationship between writing and weight-lifting, but as an aside demoted "setting and time" to the B-list of writing elements.

I got all huffy.

And Phil turned it into a blog post.

I wish I could say this was brilliant, but it's kind of like an auto mechanic knowing which wrench to use.

(The other blog with which Waveflux is tied for favorite is Shakesville, but since he's a contributor there, I guess Phil is number one.)

An integral part of the next contract for actors on Lost should be...

drivers.

The only question is, should the actors demand them or should the producers demand that the actors use them?

Fires, part 3

Marine Son is fighting the fires.

Indian Princess and Baby A remain at home, feeling secure that they're far enough away from the flames. I hope so. My greatest comfort lies in the fact that they live in military housing, and the Marine Corps will evacuate their own if it's necessary.

But Baby A is breathing polluted air through lungs that have only been operational for 34 days.

So Grandma Bitty ordered an air purifier, and after an initial delay in the UPS system, the package is back in transit, due to be delivered on Tuesday.

Get it there on Tuesday, or even sooner -- that's what I want Brown to do for me.

Tales from the Second Life: Why Opera Is Not My Thing

Today's Question of the Day at Shakesville was custom-made for me. My comment seemed to be blog-post length, so I decided to add it here, too. Three posts in one day. Am I back, do you suppose? Anyway, here's my tragic opera tale.

When I was in high school, I managed to meet one of my fondest high school goals (just about the only time I did): I made the elite chorus. I don't have that fab a voice, but I can sing on key, so there you are. The cornerstone of the chorus, I suppose. I was so excited; our chorus director was beloved by all, etc. The chorus was chosen in the spring. I couldn't wait to return in the fall, when we took our new positions.

However, over the summer the chorus director moved into administration. Administration!!!

We faced a dour, disillusioned soprano when we returned, a woman who clearly had other plans for her life, a woman who never tired of warning us not to make her raise her classically trained voice.

She had a singing partner in her other life. To this day I can't remember if he was Mr. Fish or Mr. Trout. Whichever he was, we students privately called him by the other name.

It happened in a church basement somewhere in Baltimore. Dour Soprano booked our chorus all around the area to do Christmas concerts, and one night she booked The Trout to sing along with us...without telling us. I stood front and center, right next to him. When he launched into his overblown rendition of whatever Christmas carol we had on the program, I. Lost. It.

Bent-over-double-wetting-my-pants-getting-the-hiccups lost it. I couldn't stop couldn't stop couldn't stop. I had the hysterics throughout the song, right there in front of all those little old ladies who were groovin' to "Silent Night" or something like it.

The Trout probably had a very fine voice, but I simply can't hear opera without revisiting the moment of my greatest public shame.

Alanna, I hope we can still be friends.

Postscript: I once voluntarily heard Roberta Peters in concert, so maybe I'm not completely opera-phobic.

Fires, part 2

This satellite photo, found on signonsandiego.com, the San Diego's paper's website, offers a better look (better than what I'd seen before) at where the fires are...and aren't.

Marine Son is now off fighting the fires; another map I found suggests that Alpine has not been involved in the flames (this time).

Fires

The CNN map showing the southern CA fires is grim. I'd paste it in, but rather than being a photo, it's an interactive map. In essence, Marine Son, Indian Princess, and newborn A, in Oceanside, are surrounded.

Marine Son says that within hours he'll be on the way to help with the fires in some way. Indian Princess and A are at home. Marine Son says, using his best upbeat voice, that they'll "be fine," which is the way Marine Son speaks to his mother, even in the face of disaster.

According to San Diego Fire Battalion Chief Bruce Cartelli,

It will not end ... until it reaches the ocean or the winds turn around.

I asked Marine Son what, exactly, they were being advised to do. Should all of SoCal go stand in the ocean?

Marine Son says his best friend has a boat and they'll head out in that. I don't know if he's kidding or not. If he (and presumably friend) are fighting the fire, I don't see the two wives and the newborn launching the boat from what will probably be seriously crowded boat ramps.

I've had a pen pal in Alpine (east of San Diego) since 1979. I don't have her phone number (pen pal, remember?) and the last e-mail address she gave me is no longer valid. When I was visiting there in the summer of 2005, she took me around and showed me the charred areas from the last big fire, and told me the rather dramatic story of how a neighbor saved all their homes.

I have to wonder if her lovely home still exists.

Here's the latest from CalFire on Marine Son's fire:

Rice Fire
Rice Canyon
San Diego County
This fire has burned 6,100 acres in Rice Canyon in Northern San Diego County. 500 homes have been destroyed and another 30 have been damaged. 2,500 homes are threatened. The town of Fallbrook has been evacuated. Camp Pendleton and Oceanside are threatened. 170 firefighters are assigned to this fire including 11 CAL FIRE staff.

I hope Glenn Beck is happy.

In the category of memos that don't apply to me:

"The Social Security Administration (SSA) announced yesterday that the 2008 Social Security wage base will be $102,000, an increase of $4,500 from the 2007 wage base of $97,500."

A baby is God's opinion that life should go on

Considering the awful state of affairs in this world, it's easy to understand why some people are skittish about having children.

Others are more foolish -- or more optimistic. I throw my lot with the optimists.

As does Carl Sandburg, the official poet of Bitty's Back Porch, who famously said, "A baby is God's opinion that life should go on."

As do my son and daughter-in-law, as they make their awestruck transition to parenthood.

Little A was born last night in California, a thoughtful young man who limited his birthing process to the time between late morning and 11:23 pm, allowing his parents a little sleep -- except all they wanted to do last night was keep their eyes open and gaze at this commonplace miracle.

Barry "The Man" Manilow

So here I am coming out of hiding to cheer on my long-ago crush, Barry Manilow. Whether he declined the invite or was disinvited is not that important, but Manilow did not appear on The View because he refused to be interviewed by Republican Goddess Elisabeth Hasselbeck. Directly from the "latest news" portion of Manilow's website, complete with a misspelling of Hasselbeck's name:

I wanted to let you know that I will no longer be on The View tomorrow as scheduled. I had made a request that I be interviewed by Joy, Barbara or Whoopi, but not Elisabeth Hasselback. Unfortunately, the show was not willing to accommodate this simple request so I bowed out.

It’s really too bad because I've always been a big supporter of the show, but I cannot compromise my beliefs.

When you write the songs, you don't have to suffer fools gladly.

Mini Rant: Overexposed Names Edition

Attention!

Expectant parents: think ahead. Imagine the day you gaze lovingly upon the face of your newborn daughter, poised to call her by name for the first time. If that name is Brittany (in all its spellings) or Ashley, please, please, please, please, please, please reconsider.

Experts predict that the United States will exceed its Brittany-Ashley quota by the year 2010, approximately one year after the majority of American teachers' heads are predicted to explode over the confusion caused by 75% of all young women in the classroom being known by one of the two names.

Nature Imitates Art

...or something like that. When I logged on just now, I was greeted by a graphic of Hurricane Dean, except in the instant I first saw it, I thought it was a painting by Van Gogh.

Dean

Vincent

Foregone conclusion

What Be Your Nerd Type? Your Result: Literature Nerd Does sitting by a nice cozy fire with a cup of hot tea/chocolate and a book you can read for hours even when your eyes grow red and dry and you look sort of scary sitting there with your insomniac appearance appeal to you? Then you fit this category perfectly! You love the power of the written word and its eloquence, and you may like to read/write poetry or novels. You contribute to the smart people of today's society; however, you can probably be overly-critical of works. It's okay. I understand.
Drama Nerd
Social Nerd
Artistic Nerd
Science/Math Nerd
Gamer/Computer Nerd
Musician
Anime Nerd
What Be Your Nerd Type? Quizzes for MySpace

So when I saw this quiz at Shakesville, I took it myself, even though I knew the conclusion before I read the first question. Anyway, the questions hardly touch my nerdiness level. I mean, question #26, How many books have you read in your lifetime?, offers as its extreme answer 60 plus. What kind of book nerdishness does that signify? I probably own 600 plus. Never mind all the library books I borrowed and books I've given away. And those two degrees I have in literature? Not a single question about that.

I'm not a literature nerd. I'm a literature super-nerd. And what qualifies me as one more than anything is that I'm extremely aware of just how much I haven't read and probably can't get to in a single lifetime.

And as the ultimate proof of my literature nerdiness, I completed the incomplete sentence and corrected the grammar and punctuation errors in the narrative of the quiz results before I posted it. We won't be having any of that on MY blog.

Scribbles from the past

I found an old notebook, a small one, the kind I carry in my purse in case Something Needs to be Written Down.

Clues, such as an old Christmas shopping list that includes the name of my son's former fiancee, suggest that I started it about 3 years ago, then misplaced it for a while until I found it again last spring and used it to take notes from a lecture I attended.

It contains several lists of names, obviously students' names, but I don't remember most of these students. It sometimes distresses me how many of them simply flee my memory. In the early years I only taught a few classes at a time and over the years some students voluntarily came back to me for seconds, but a good estimate of the average number of students I've taught each year is 200. Nine years, 200 names a year -- probably I've forgotten 1600 of those 1800. This saddens me, because I tend to really like most of them.

I've found old to-do lists and notes from department meetings, and the thing that I actually wanted when I pulled out the notebook -- a folded-up handout from that spring lecture.

The oddest thing in the notebook, however, is this message to myself, in large letters, clearly intended to catch my attention:

POINT THE ARROWS TOWARD THE PATIO DOOR!

I have no idea.

I Hate When That Happens

I'm reading final papers, compiling final grades. Once that's done, I am finally free to CLEAN MY HOUSE! MOW MY LAWN! RECONNECT WITH MY FRIENDS! RECONNECT WITH MY FAMILY! GET BACK TO UNFINISHED PROJECTS! Etc.

So I took a break to have a snack and watch a little TV in my bedroom. (The living room TV has been disconnected for seven weeks; I was in mid-project when my summer semester began, and that's still the status of the project: mid.) The next thing I know, the poppies have overtaken me and I'm lying down. Ok. A half-hour snooze wouldn't hurt.

Four and a half hours later, I awaken.

Oh, this stinks.

Cool news

I made two major changes to my electrical consumption during the same week, about 6 weeks ago. I changed most of my light bulbs to compact fluorescents (the remaining light fixtures get used either rarely or briefly). And Tall Son finally rendered operational the recycled central air conditioning unit that he salvaged for me last summer.

This time last year I was cooling by using two window a/c units and keeping my spare bedroom and office doors closed, so I was only cooling a part of my house.

To add to the equation, two weeks ago I had removed the tree in front of my house that provided shade during the afternoons, so I'm sure that the a/c now has to work even harder to keep me cool.

I’ve spent one very comfortable month: I keep the temp at about 75, even at night (I sleep poorly if I’m hot).

So today I got the electric bill, and I fully expected that upon opening that bill I’d have to turn the a/c up to 80 and start living in the dark.

Wrong.

The bill is for $74.69. For a full month. In Florida.

The recycled a/c is a Trane, but it’s 10 years old, so I wasn’t sure it would be all that efficient. I suppose it is.

My electric company offers interesting statistics on the bill: the KWH total and daily average and the same info from the same month one year earlier. Last summer, same month, with partial-home a/c and incandescent bulbs, I used a daily average KWH of 29. This summer, it’s 25.

I won’t really know the impact of the bulbs alone until a/c season is over and I can compare KWH consumption during the heating months to last year’s consumption.

But for now...cool!

Where did the mud go?

Yesterday I was on the phone with my daughter, who was in her backyard, and I overheard her Littlest, age 3, approach her and ask, "Where did the mud go?"

Apparently the day before his toy had been muddy, but now it wasn't.

“Here it is,” my daughter said. “It dried up. It’s dirt now. Mud is dirt mixed with water.”

“It is?” he asked incredulously. “Mud is dirt?” Littlest has a most appealing way of emphasizing his words when he’s expressing his amazement. Like Shirley Temple, only less precious.

At age three, one finds much to be amazed by.

Like mud, whose secret identity is dirt.

Dear Netflix,

I know you’ve been worried about your movie. I’ve had it for over three weeks, and now you’re putting little notes on my queue, gently letting me know that it’s ok if something’s gone wrong with the disk; I can let you know without getting punished.

Well, Netflix, the disk is ok. I’ve just been really busy. You’ll see that other disks have come to and gone from my mailbox, but that’s because they’re episodic TV. I can fit in a 40 minute TV fix where I can’t manage a 120 minute flick.

And, oh, I don’t know. I think this disk was giving out vibes. I only vaguely knew what it was about anyway: general concept, big awards nominated and won. But I couldn’t get myself to actually put it in the DVD player.

Last night I did. Netflix, although it was tough for me to part with some films, such as Remains of the Day and Capote, you can have Adaptation back. I liked it and I hated it. I’m so confused.

(SPOILER ALERT!)

It was, at first, stunningly – almost annoyingly – clever, so not-Hollywood. I even loved the revelation of “Susan Orlean’s” secret life. Because I was rather enjoying myself, I had such a sinking feeling when the movie decidedly went Hollywood. “Susan” decides to solve her problem by becoming a homicidal maniac? What?

On the other hand, the ending might be part of the looping-around metatextual nature of the film. After all, everything changed immediately after Charlie had his one-on-one with Robert McKee, the motivational hack screenwriting coach. So, upon McKee’s advice, Charlie – the fictional and the real one – does precisely what earlier he said he wouldn’t: “I just don’t want to ruin it by making it a Hollywood thing.”

I either get it: Kaufman’s making an ironic statement about the inability to escape the Hollywood ending (and didn't Altman already cover that in The Player?).

Or I don’t get it.

Anyway, Netflix, stop worrying. The disk is in the mail.

Love,
Bitty