Last night I stayed up until almost 3am watching Brick. I started it at 11:30 and it was only supposed to be two hours long, but it was so good that I kept pausing it after parts that I especially like, to let them sink in and kind of sigh over them a little bit. Plus I had to stop to investigate the strange clicking sound that my refrigerator was emitting - regularly and inexplicably, and to make snacks and bake cookies and change into pajamas and engage in every other possible distraction. Staying up late was probably a bad choice, because today I'm all tired and out of whack. Danny and I went to Scheuler today to make fun of books and eat and things. My skin always crawls a little when I go in there; I half-way imagine I'm going to see people I don't want to see popping out from behind a bookshelf, even though they're probably in Ann Arbor or on Mars or somewhere equally far and safely away. Still, I don't like it. But we were there and my point was that coffee was necessary, which it usually isn't with me, but today it was because I stayed up so late.

I've been especially clumsy all weekend, banging into corners and dropping numerous jars, utensils, bottles, clothes, you name it. I think it's because I'm subconsciously nervous about the new semester starting. I had my kids do an evaluation at the end of last semester, and they almost unanimously said they thought I should be stricter. So I'll be trying that starting Monday. But I don't really want to talk about school and my inability to manage my classroom. I'm tired of talking about that.

It was suggested to me that I be more candid here, and kind of let loose and say what I'm really thinking. At first I insisted that I held back because I thought people wouldn't like me anymore if they knew what I really thought about things, but the more I thought about it, I realized that the reason I censor myself has more to do with trust than anything else. Those of you who know me well do know how I feel about things like school and boys and life in general, because we talk about them when we're together. I don't need the strangers who wander by here (or the opposite - the people we talk about when we discuss school and boys and life) knowing my most personal thoughts and feelings, because they will be getting all of that information out of context and almost certainly drawing incorrect conclusions, which doesn't do anybody any good. So I have elected to keep things fluffy here in print, and save the heavy stuff for real life talking and the paper journal of course (except for the occasional Judy rant or a "Teaching is hard and makes me tired" eruption).

And speaking of not judging people when we find out things we didn't know about them...did anyone else see the picture on facebook of Ryan Bonneville smoking? I mean, What?!

And speaking of fluffy, I have a question. What would you do for five dollars? Danny was taking a poll the other day, and I thought of a few good answers, but then I kind of ran dry. I was also surprised at how my personal values were kind of revealed through what I would and would not do for money. I might turn this into a kind of creative writing assignment were my kids have to characterize a fictional person by listing what they would and would not do for a certain amount of money. I noticed that a lot of the things I came up with involved eating things, licking things, or putting things in my mouth. Also, it was easier to think of things I wouldn't do for five dollars rather than things I would. Or I could think of things I'd do for twenty dollars, but not for five. Here's my list...help me add to it if you can, or tell me what you'd do for five dollars (I hate it when blogs turn into requests for reader participation, so don't feel obliged...I'm just curious). Anyway, my list:

For five dollars I would eat a pound of peanut butter
For five dollars I would lick my shoe
For five dollars I would chew somebody else's used gum
For five dollars I would pick my nose
For five dollars I would sing you a dirty song
For five dollars I would tell you a dirty secret
For five dollars I would superglue my fingers together
For five dollars I would say inappropriate things to a stranger

(And just for the record...)
For five dollars I would not do anything that involved getting naked
For five dollars I would not sing karaoke
For five dollars I would not tell a malicious lie
For five dollars I would not physically hurt anyone else
For five dollars I would not eat something that I believed would make me sick

Sunday Things

I work out, and then I eat cookies. So. Tomorrow, call me and tell me not to eat cookies. And the day after that, call me again. And the day after that.

Daisy loves bananas. She's a monkey on the inside. I always knew it.

Today Danny Lynn and I went to lunch, and listening to her talk, I felt like I was on Sex in the City, only I had no good stories to add. Well, I mean, I had a couple. But nothing scandalous. Is that something I need to work on?

I'm afraid I've forgotten how to appreciate snow. It starts up and I immediately think about the parking situation and the scraping situation and the driving situation, and I feel put upon by the snow, hassled, and I grumble. Or I go to the computer and start checking up on the school-closing situation - as if this snow is only going to be worth it if I get some kind of time off out of it. But that's the wrong way to look at it entirely. It's worth it because when it snows, winter feels normal again, and it's beautiful, and it makes me want to nestle down in my chair with a book, and it reminds me that I'm warm and comfortable and should be happy. This afternoon, for the first time in a long time, I watched it snow the right way.

Finally, I've decided I'm going to Spain this summer, for a little while at least, between the weddings. You should come with me.

Odd things, like a button drawer. Mean
Things, fishhooks, barbs in your hand.
But marbles too. A genius for being agreeable.
Junkyard crucifixes, voluptuous
discards. Space for knickknacks, and for
Alaska. Evidence to hang me, or to beatify.
Clues that lead nowhere, that never connected
anyway. Deliberate obfuscation, the kind
that takes genius. Chasms in character.
Loud omissions. Mornings that yawn above
a new grave. Pages you know exist
but you can't find them. Someone's terribly
inevitable life story, maybe mine.

What's in my Journal
William Stafford


Okay, it's not Frank O'Hara, but I like and agree with the part about chasms in character and deliberate obfuscation. Plus I think journaling about journaling (or, technically blogging about blogging I suppose) is appropriate and necessary once in a while to maintain a proper level of perspective and gravity (or lack thereof) in places like this. All of that meta- stuff. Love it. I used to collect quotes and half-amusing things like this on my xanga page and just post them privately. But there's no such thing as privacy here. (How terrifying.) Anyway, that's where this would go if here were still there, so no judging me based on the fact that I like this mediocre poem. I happen to like all different kinds of poems, good, bad, and ugly alike.

A Poem for Emily Robinson on Her Birthday Because We Love Her

Oh Emily dear,
you're one cool chick;
you can palpitate kneecaps
without getting sick.

You're going to med school
which we all think is awesome.
You tried to save puppy
but then sadly lost him.

When you come to Grand Rapids
Cool kids always follow,
and we have adventures
que son nunca malo.

We hang out at Craft Barn
buying magnets and paints,
and call Jess Grabowski
who lives 'cross the state.

And then there's the Thai food
and Bombay Cuisine
And the Cherry Deli
(the cute boy's name is Dean!)

So my waistline has grown,
since knowing you, dear,
as has my appreciation
for Palak Panir.

Remember in school
when we hung out all day?
Well those times are over
and I just have to say (BOO! And...)

Even though there will be no
better-than-sex cake today,
we're all thinking of you
and just wanted to say

How supremely delightful
we all think you are...
and by "we" I mean me.
Happy birthday!! Rar!

School did end up being cancelled today, but I didn't get a chance to read much Frank O'Hara. Instead I did a bunch of work that I should have finished over the weekend. Second semester is looming, and apparently I think that if I ignore it, it will go away or something? I don't know. At least now I've got syllabi sent to print and that first week is hammered out. Also, I have a concrete To Do list to tackle this week, which is better than that nebulous "Hm, I'd better start thinking of what I'm going to do" thing.

I'm excited and nervous to start teaching Creative Writing again. The first time you teach something you have this ready-made excuse for things that you screw up, and it's pretty easy not to beat yourself up about every little hiccup. But now it feels like the bar has been raised. It will probably be nice and not terrible at all. I just have to wait and see.

World Lit will be a repeat too, but I'm changing almost all of my assessments, so the focus and timing of the daily lessons will be different. It won't be much like repeating the stuff I used last year, but not having to actually sit down and read each of the novels should ameliorate some of the pain of my novel-heavy work load this semester. Besides the three in World Lit, English 11 will be reading five novels during the next 18 weeks (if they whine I'm going to tell them about the novel-a-week classes we English majors relished in undergrad), two of which I've never read at all, and one I haven't picked up since tenth grade. So part of my productive afternoon today was spent chipping away at the first few chapters of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, which we will be starting exactly two weeks from today. If I can maintain the two-week cushion all semester for all four of my preps, I tell you hwhat [sic], I will be one happy girl come June. If if if.

Why is it that whenever there is a winter storm warning for bad weather to hit during the night I always start praying? I know that's not what praying is for. But there the words are anyway, slipping out of the mouth inside my head: "Please, God, let there be no school tomorrow." Wishing and praying are two entirely different things, with entirely different intents and purposes. So I guess what I do is wish, and casually mention my wish to my good pal Jesus, without hope or agenda. Right.

And I've put the sheets made of beech tree fiber back on my bed so it is once again (un)officially the most comfortable place in the country if not the world. I'd forgotten how much I loved those sheets - jersey be damned! is what I say from now on.

And (and and and...) this is my statement about why I've been writing lame, unfunny posts lately: First of all, I blame my new dark apartment with the prison-bar-looking screens in which the light never gets past "dim dusky twilight" - even on snowybright January afternoons. I am a plant and I crave light and this is not not not going to work. Second, I keep sitting down to start a post, but there's something wrong every time - they don't come out right, or I'm not getting at what I'm really trying to say. Lately I guess I feel like I haven't been sounding like myself, or I haven't been sounding like I used to at least. And I liked how I used to sound, back in the xanga days. So I need to wait for that voice to come back. It was the voice of me in college though, so perhaps its absence is a symptom of this next phase and I just need to get used to being boring. Or you all need to move to Grand Rapids so things can start being funny again. But now I'm rambling. At least some characteristics of my blogging voice haven't changed.

I really like Frank O'Hara. If there is a snow day tomorrow I'm going to read him all day long.

You do not always seem to be able to decide
that it is all right, that you are doing what you're doing
and yet there is always that complicity in your smile
that it is we, not you, who are doing it
which is one of the things that makes me love you

Update: Things are better. Not great, but okay enough. For now. I have bamboo anyway. So don't worry about it, if you were worrying. Tonight I'm making Indonesian Chicken (with batsmati rice) on my new grill. I'm excited. It will be so good.

I should write in all of my books while I read them. But only with pencil. I just finished A Farewell to Arms. Love is very strange, and awfully scary, through Ernest's eyes.

And I just don't know.

Today's Post Brought To You By The Word Wimper and the Number 8

After a good cry, my thoughts are still pretty jumbled, but if you ask me about it right now, I will tell you that I'm almost certainly moving soon. Soon as in a few months, or less perhaps. I presently feel absolutely terrible, and if I lived anywhere else I would not feel absolutely terrible, I would feel excited about my new window treatments. Instead, I am thinking about the hassle of returning all of that stuff I had such a good time acquiring yesterday; I am thinking about the hours my mom and I spent this afternoon rigging and arranging and generally being extremely frustrated until suddenly everything started looking fabulous; I am thinking about giving up the idea of doing anything that will make my apartment look prettier or more finished or cozy or pleasant to be in, anything that involves any holes at all. Have you ever tried decorating without putting any holes in anything? It doesn't work very well.

In the course of the twenty minutes it took her to avoid a simple "no" but convey that exact message along with a slew of depreciating comments and condescension, it was implied by a certain sour-faced landlady that people getting their first apartment (coughthiskidrightherecough) might not belong in her building because these type of people are so eager to put a myriad of new a creative decorating ideas into action - and her attic is no place for creativity or decoration. It's for blank walls and ugly old paint and dark screens that block out half of the sunlight and kill all of your remaining plants. And from a place like that, I've made a living space that is generally tolerable and boarder line pleasant to be in. But I can only do so much before I'm shut down, and she does it in such a thorough and soul-squelching way that I am loath to ask for permission to do anything ever again, until I ask for permission to move out.

...And reading over this I think I sound like a spoiled kid who is mad because someone told her No for once and she doesn't like it. But it's not the No, but the manner of the No that bothers me so much. And how I always want to be accommodating and try to compromise and generally be the nice, good, people-pleasing person I'm wired as, and I hate when that also makes me someone who is easy to make into a doormat. And standing up for myself is really hard to do, and when I DO try to really commit to an idea and fight for it (or at least don't back down for a few rounds and actually attempt to argue back instead...which always makes me feel funny) and it still gets vetoed, I don't know. It sucks. And it hurts my feelings when I bend over backward to make things fit into someone's crazy specifications and I still come off being treated as a disobedient trouble-maker who needs to be reminded of her place. Hurts my feelings and insults me and I'm in that situation so rarely that I really don't know how to operate within it, so of course I start crying. And I can't remember the last time someone said or did something that made me cry. Did the mean tech guy make me cry? I think I wanted to, but was able to hold off. Anyway. Gross night.

Tomorrow will be better.

And the Warm Weather is Holding

Tonight I was curled up in my chair listening to the rain on my windows letting Hemingway put me to sleep, and I looked around and was very happy. The post-vacation loneliness (that is inevitable after a small space has been filled with bodies and voices and the flurry of jolly girls and tall boys and laughing for days and days on end and then is suddenly emptied again) has worn off and it's nice to have my quiet little space back. But I also kind of wish you all lived just a little bit closer. Just a little bit, you know?

In other news, my Amazon wish list is seriously out of control. I like to scroll through it and imagine I actually have time to read all those books right now or sometime in the not-so-distant future. But we all know that isn't and won't be true.

And Judy and I had a checklist-driven chat the other day and painting and window treatments are not impossibilities - just near-impossibilities. (So many dashes tonight! Jeez on man.) Anyway, I'm going curtain shopping and paint-chip browsing this weekend, just to torture myself. Also, I flexed my Only Child Whining Skills during said conversation and postponed the reinstallation of the Ugly Screens for another few months. Maybe I can get Daisy to eat them before they go back up. Or something.

Full of Indian food and done cleaning up, I am monumentally tired.

What a good good good time. More to follow (perhaps).

To reiterate: so. tired. Jeezy Creezy.

History of the Night

Throughout the course of the generations
men constructed the night.
At first she was blindness;
thorns raking bare feet,
fear of wolves.
We shall never know who forged the word
for the interval of shadow
dividing the two twilights;
we shall never know in what age it came to mean
the starry hours.
Others created the myth.
They made her the mother of the unruffled Fates
that spin our destiny,
they sacrificed black ewes to her, and the cock
who crows his own death.
The Chaldeans assigned to her twelve houses;
to Zeno, infinite words.
She took shape from Latin hexameters
and the terror of Pascal.
Luis de Leon saw in her the homeland
of his stricken soul.
Now we feel her to be inexhaustible
like an ancient wine
and no one can gaze on her without vertigo
and time has charged her with eternity.

And to think that she wouldn't exist
except for those fragile instruments, the eyes.

-JLB




ps - Ben tells the best stories.

Jolly Indeed

Conquests are fun and silly and I really need to grow up about it already, but really. I mean, we mustn't forget ourselves here. Propriety and details and all of that.

So, Emily and Julie and Kat are coming here soon, and Annie and Jess are also coming here, and there will be fondue and dirty santa and possibly (probably) other dirty things as well. I'm looking forward to it immensely, but when they come, it will be the last fun thing that happens before school rushes back in and sweeps me away (don't even talk to me about New Years - we all know how I feel about that...). I've been terrible this break about counting down the days, and even though there are twelve of them, I'm not enjoying each one completely because in the back of my mind I keep thinking that there's one more day gone and here comes work again and it's awful because why can't I just forget my teacher-self for more than twenty minutes and immerse myself in friends and family and sleeping and cleaning and reading and baking. It just doesn't work. I'm broken. But maybe fondue and the Apartment Six girls will help fix things.

Also, I want to go to Prague. Like now. And Budapest. And Cordoba.

For Christmas (in case anybody was wondering) there was a new teapot that whistles, deluxe scrabble con diccionario, perfume, sweaters, soup bowls, a grill, an itunes gift card, a pasta jar (finally), a 2007 calendar, a white puffy vest, some chocolate, a haircut, assorted other apartment things, and a text message from Zach Tolstyka.

Why don't we use different toothbrushes when we're sick? Doesn't it seem like sticking all those germy bristles in your mouth twice a day would be detrimental to getting well again? Or is toothpaste strong enough to kill the germs? I bring this up because I've been ill this weekend. This is the first cold I've had since getting my nose pierced, and I've got to admit, it's kind of annoying. Good thing I don't get sick very often. This afternoon I'm committed to getting as healthy as possible, so I'm ignoring all of the friends pouring back into town for their ridiculously long college-type vacations and relegating myself to the couch with a glass of Sunny D and a pile of journals to grade. Plus I just discovered that the lovely people at TNT are showing the LotR trilogy all afternoon (and on into the evening...) so it looks like I picked a good day to sloth it up indoors. I just wish it weren't so sunny outside.

Living alone for the first time, I'm slowly discovering things about myself that I never knew before. For instance, this evening I learned that I can carry $65 worth of groceries up two flights of stairs in one trip. (Are you impressed?) I also managed to slice my finger open during the haul in which my grocery-packing prowess was evidenced, and I didn't notice until I saw the smear of blood on my fresh, new box of honey nut cheerios. Gross? Kind of. And I hate band-aided fingers. They're so cumbersome and stiff. I had planned on updating my hair color and making rice crispy treats tonight, but both of those will be noticeably impeded by a bulky digit. Luckily, I can still take out the trash and change the cat litter, so the night isn't a total loss. Oh no! And tomorrow is Christmas Wrapping Cookie Decorating Day. I wonder if I can train myself to tape and frost with my toes in the next twelve hours.

nothing everyone hasn't heard/felt/realized before, but...

I love how it takes me almost a week to get around to making unplesant phone calls home to parents, a fairly simple and straighforward activity, yet Emily, Julie, Kat and I can simultaneously coordinate our four (count 'em!) ridiculously busy holiday scheudles and successfully plan a multi-day get-together in less than three hours (give or take). Same rule seems to apply for how long it takes me to get through a stack of Ad Analysis papers versus the time it takes me to read Glamour from (back) cover to (front) cover. Huh.

Q: What do my four English preps have in common with female roommates living in close quarters?
A: No matter what their scheudles were at the beginning of the year, eventually they're all on the same cycle.

Okay, that was awful, I know. But it's also true. Through no effort or intention of my own, this week all four of my classes are finishing up units, which means taking tests, writing papers, and doing projects. For the past three days, I have spent the 5 hours between 4 and 9 pm grading grading grading and then grading some more (with breaks to eat and blog, of course). And it's not over. Monday Macbeth projects were due, Tuesday Macbeth literary analysis papers and Word Journals were due, along with vocab. Today World Lit took an essay test on Siddhartha, and Writng for the Real World handed in their Ad Analysis papers. Tomorrow WftRW has a short test on logical fallacies and on Friday Eng 11 takes their sonnet quiz and Apply hands in their Macbeth projects. Oof!! It's just the pace at which things are rolling (what do we say about momentum? we hate it, right?) To put off any fo these assessments would gum up my schedule and make things hectic later...so instead they can be hectic now? At least they're only hectic outside of the classroom. And since all of this is happening now, my holiday break should be comparitively school-work-free which will leave time for social events when other people are actually around and available. So now that I've whined about it I guess I can step back and say it will be all right...as long as I don't die of paper cuts before the week is through.

Also, I've decided Tuesday is the worst day of the week. Fucking Tuesday I've begun to call it (only in my head and occasionally under my breath, of course). I'm always tired on Tuesday. By Wednesday the slide toward the end of the week has already started, and on Monday I'm still refreshed from the weekend. Tuesday is that point where, if one were to compare getting through the week to swimming the English Channel, you've come too far to go back, but there's still so far to go, and everything is cold and grey and wet and miserable. You have to paddle on, but you don't have to like it.

And Suddenly I'm Not Tired At All

Last night some city utility trucks parked on the street outside my window. At 7ish they started their motors and commenced to dig a giant hole in the ground and futz around (loudly). Amid the drilling, jack-hammering, clanging, chuffing, and generally making a terrible ruckus...surprise!...they turned the water off. The noise kept up non-stop until 5 this morning. I slept for maybe half an hour total, and spent the rest of the night tossing, turning, and running through alternative plans to shower and get ready for school if my water was still off in the morning, plus intermittently peering out the window waiting for this huge "snowstorm" they predicted to actually arrive and save me from a potentially fatigued, greasy, and generally heinous day.

The call came at 5:25, and that's all I'm going to say because nobody likes a gloater.

How school (in)appropriate is the tshirt that I'm about to buy?

It reads: I'm a sucker for diction.

I'm thinking it's perfect for Covert-Sexual-Innuendo-Casual Friday.

The moon is the mother of pathos and pity.

When, at the wearier end of November,
Her old light moves along the branches,
Feebly, slowly, depending upon them;
When the body of Jesus hangs in a pallor,
Humanly near, and the figure of Mary,
Touched on by hoar-frost, shrinks in a shelter
Made by the leaves, that have rotted and fallen;
When over the houses, a golden illusion
Brings back an earlier season of quiet
And quieting dreams in the sleepers in darkness -

The moon is the mother of pathos and pity.

-WS, Lunar Paraphrase

(perhaps this will be my November poem next year)

Things That I Do and Notice Now that I'm on Vacation

Tonight I had a superglue adventure. My cup and doorknob are fixed. I'm also missing a few patches of finger skin. And I no longer need an alarm clock because we have bats, or at least a bat, who likes to chirp at 5am. And I'm losing my hair in volumes sizable enough to make me slightly uncomfortable. Probably because of stress? Certainly not because I keep dying it (it's got a little red in it now...festive, right?). Whatever the reason, I wish it would stop. I don't want to be bald before I'm thirty. Maybe I should go get some vitamins or something.