West of Feminism

Have I missed blogging? Obviously not enough to make me even visit. Today, however, I saw the following quote in The Writer's Almanac, a newsletter I receive via email.
"Rebecca West said, 'I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is; I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat or a prostitute.'" She wrote in the early 1900s, but the sentiment is so current. I can think of several conversation possibilities in my life in 2008 when her observation would fit my frustration.

Trebuchet

I could not resist this font--it is named trebuchet. Isn't that some kind of Medieval weapon? With a French sounding name, I would think there would be curls or at least serif. Funny, it doesn't look snotty.
I am trying to catch up on school work: correcting papers, entering grades, prepping lessons at least one day ahead. I am almost there. Other areas of life are not quite so neatly delineated. 'Tis the problem. I need assignments and deadlines for housework and relationships and such.

Dysinspiration

I am at school feeling pretty uninspired. Class did not go as well as I had hoped. I think I had too little planned, and then some woman dominated the conversation--me. It is always better if I can get them to discuss and discover. Maybe some pumpkin spice cookies would help.

Pumpkin, Anyone?

I feel perfectly safe confessing my indiscretions in this space. My husband would probably never venture into this part of the Internet anyway. He was not home this evening, so I was left to my own devices (is that the expression?), literally. A rather large pumpkin graced our front porch for Halloween. I did not go to the trouble of carving it but instead drew a black cat and wrote a greeting, both with magic marker. It is two weeks past Trick-or-Treat, and the nightly temperature is reaching down into the 20's, so I concluded it was time to bring in the pumpkin and cook it. We have done this before, either boiling or baking until soft enough to peel and mash for use in pies, cookies, and bread. I think my husband must have cut and gutted the pumpkin in previous encounters because I do not remember fighting through that tough flesh before. Naturally, I took what my husband would refer to as a woman's approach. I tried the largest of the carving knives in his set--probably over $100 per knife--and could not get enough leverage to even halve the vegetable (or is it a fruit?). Then I tried the more expensive cleaver. No luck. So I inserted the cleaver or the carving knife by turn and used the other, butt end of the handle, to ever so gently tap the sharp object into the seed cavity. Had poor Terry walked in during the process, he would have surely lost consciousness. I was successful, of course, but I doubt I will share the story with the owner of the knives.

Feliz Navidad

There is a radio station coming out of East St. Louis, 101.2 FM I think, that is changing formats the first of the year. In the meantime, they have chosen to play all Christmas and have been for about a month. I used to be irritated by commercial pushes of Christmas into November and even October, but with age has come a desire to live outside of reality occasionally. So I am hooked on Christmas songs and Halloween is barely over. Who knows--next year I may get out the Christmas albums, as in vinyl records, in July.
Yesterday I had dropped my husband at an appointment and was listening to my guilty pleasure when some little gremlins almost spoiled my mood. First there was a rendition of "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" not by Karen Carpenter (That rendition gives me a chill when I think that she probably wanted to eat the sheet music even without condiments) but by Gloria Estefan, or maybe it was Mariah Carey. It was awful and breathy and left a sour taste in my mouth. I am obviously learning disabled when it comes to pop divas, but the song that followed the above atrocity could have been redeeming if sung by the right artist. It was "Feliz Navidad" by--are you sitting down?--Celine Dion. Isn't she French Canadian or something? I felt I was in some previously undiscovered space warp. Would I ever find Christmas again? Finally there was an instrumental of "The Carol of the Bells" and I was able to breathe again.

Election Night

I voted and my choice at the top of the ticket has been declared first runner-up. Never have I felt so dangerously disconnected from what has become the majority. Well, I will have four years to examine my current state of mind. Maybe it is more environmental than core belief. I wonder if Sarah Palin's family think it was worth the trouble.

Voting

I am voting for McCain. He is not my hero, but as I mature, I find that politics and heroics rarely mix. He is just closer to my way of thinking on several fronts. I fully understand that there will be people who vote for Senator McCain whom I would never consider inviting into my home. They may be mixed up in various special interest groups that I would rather not support. Recognizing strange bedfellows, however, does not make me hesitate to cast my precious vote for the Republican. I also admit that he was not my choice for the Republican ticket. Now I have but two choices, McCain and Senator Obama. Other possibilities will not actually win the electoral votes, so it is down to these two men and their policies. I am probably more conservative than McCain on some fiscal issues, and I am more liberal on some social issues. He still better represents my way of thinking, as far as I can tell in this imperfect world of media and campaigning, than Obama ever would. I have to add that at least a small percentage of my decision is based on gut. There you have it. Please do not assume this is a knee jerk reaction or that my thinking is necessarily flawed by racism or succumbing to rumor. I have not abandoned thought or hope. I have merely decided.

Shocking

So I was mentally congratulating myself as I walked up the stairs to the 2nd floor. Today went well. I didn't accomplish all I wanted to get done, but I managed to get through the day pretty well. It also occurred to me that no one had suggested EST for me, something a woman I know had been prescribed. Is that the sum of what life has become? I did a few chores, talked to a few people, and did not have to face electric shock treatments, so I was satisfied, almost elated. Is this pathetic or is this "good enough" living?

One more query--why is it so much easier to recognize sadness and joy and true discernment in someone else"s life?

Listen and Learn

Recently I have noticed that the more I say, the more I am misunderstood. It has happened in several venues, and I am concerned. There was a time that I would have immediately countered with a "but. . . ." Now I hesitate wrapped in the fear that I only respond or correct in order to enjoy my own spoken or written voice. Resorting to silence, at least politically, frees me to observe and learn. The anger in the current political atmosphere stifles discussion anyway. Why should I take the trouble to comment if no one is attempting to really listen to me?

Rhetorical Musings

I just sent a comment to my eldest daughter's blog. In it, I referred to the vituperative rhetoric in the current presidential campaign. I am somewhere in this awful middle ground which is worse than any limbo. I am conservative when it comes to finances, but I support some social programs. As I get older, I believe more and more that government is not the answer, so socialism is not my cup of tea.
My daughter is frustrated and angered by the "Kill him" comment made by an audience member at a Sarah Palin rally. I found some media coverage of the incident, coverage that I felt was not conservative b.s., and I included the link. In the article and linked videos, discerning the audience shouts is not so simple. Of course Palin attempts to elicit response--that is her job. I also pointed out some negative campaigning in which the democrats have engaged, and I closed suggesting neither side nor any politician is particularly innocent. Now I worry that she will only see my comment as some challenge to her ability to interpret her world.
I too am upset by the election and the statistics and half truths we Americans are fed every four years. I am tired of making voting decisions on the basis of the lesser evil. Looking for info on the Florida rally, I came across a local article on my mother-in-law's parish and a sermon their new priest gave this past Sunday. A union leader, a lifelong Catholic and a democrat, accused the priest of comparing Obama to Hitler in a reference to the pro-life issue. According to this man, the priest also said that people who vote for Obama would be condemned by the church. The union man was so angered that he stood up and challenged the priest and then left the service. Later in the article, the writer reports that the printed copy of the sermon did not make that particular reference. The reporter in turn asked the priest if he wavered from the written text, and the priest claimed he did not. He also added that he would not make the statement about church condemnation because it is not true. The original accuser stuck by his story. I know a little about the priest, a convert from Judaism and a latecomer to the vocation--39 and just ordained. My mother-in-law really likes him. I noticed that the reporter did not interview other parishioners, so all that we have is a "he said; he said." There was more to the article. Of course I pick out what suits my purpose, but then EVERYBODY DOES. I keep thinking of incidents I have witnessed and then read about in some media outlet. I am always amazed at how skewed the story becomes.
Now I am rambling and I have only 4 hours left to sleep tonight. No solution to this uneasiness right now.

More Synthetic Stuff

I have had a gradual med change over the past year or so. Other changes have ensued. So I wonder what is correlation; what is cause and effect? What might only be coincidence? There are no definitive answers, and I am not consumed by the questions. They just cross through my range of thought occasionally.
Now I have had two doses of the synvisc--the medication that does not actually cushion the bones in my knee joints but somehow magically encourages my body to do that work. That is, if it works which is only about a 50-50 possibility. I think my knees feel a little better. Maybe that is a placebo effect. Again, there are more questions than answers, a current theme in my life. On the other hand, I may just enjoy the needles in the knees experience and want to encourage that behavior among medical professionals I encounter.

Too Tired

I am so tired. It is almost a soul tired. Physically I need sleep, but emotionally and spiritually I need some R&R as well. Now if I will only allow myself the indulgence of revitalization. . .

Not So Funny

Some reduction in squirrel activity today. Maybe they read my blog. I lay in bed the other night and I processed through some hilarious stuff before drifting. I wish I could remember what was so funny. I could have used some good stand-up in class today. It was classic underprepared death spiral. I was running late and could not find the calendar I wanted to copy. Then the journal entry put most of the students in a bad mood. I finally topped it off with too little to do to fill the time. I am usually better at ad libbing. But I salvaged the rest of the day with a meditative visit to the art museum. Yummmmm. I even purchased a couple of art sticker books to share with my granddaughters. So we will be discussing Cassatt and Vermeer. And maybe I will locate my sense of humor again.

The Squirrel Wars

About the squirrels. . .We have a small fountain on our back, outside wall next to the door that leads from the kitchen to a small deck of about 10X10 square feet. The fountain has a pump that circulates water through a lions mouth into a semi circular bowl that overfills into a second, larger bowl. It provides a pleasant water trickling sound and is visually pleasing as well. Occasionally we add a little bleach to the water to cut down on algae growth. Chlorine or no, the local squirrel population has deemed the fountain their watering hole. I do not begrudge them the fluid refreshment, but washing squirrel excrement from our only path back to our parking area on the alley has become a daily chore. This is not a few stray turds. I can only conclude that the water has a laxative effect. The first few feet out our back door is liberally sprinkled with poop every morning. It is unsanitary and dragging the stuff in on our shoes is an added feature.
We have upped the chlorine content to no avail. My husband added Joy to the mix which created a sudsy sculpture between the bowls but did not reduce the squirrel droppings. I would think that they are only coming to make use of the facility as a restroom, but if we disconnect the pump and allow the fountain to run dry, we are left no little gifts.
We own two cats who are completely useless in this instance. Not only are they indoor cats, they also show no inclination to even want to venture outside. I have considered leaving the back door open at night to expose the nocturnal poop distributors to the meows through the screens, but we sleep on the second floor and the cats offer no security.
There is a neighbor cat who likes to sun on our back walk, but she finds her home each night, so my plan to feed her and assure her loyalty is not going to help.
I have considered a perigrine falcon. I am just not sure I could deal with any extra squirrel carcasses, and the neighbors who own small dogs might complain. I know I could turn off the fountain, but then they win. I even tried a liberal distribution of chili powder around the periphery of the apparatus. There were squirrel prints in the powder the following day. All of this makes me look forward to a hard freeze and winterizing the fountain: cleaning and drying it.
There is a nesting pair of redtailed hawks over in Tower Grove Park, but how to entice. . .

Symply Synthetic

Needles in the knees yesterday. Placebo effect today. I walked at the Botanical Gardens as though I had no arthritis. That was only the first of three injections in each knee. I asked about where the artificial substance went. Is it somehow absorbed into my system? Will I wake up one day with enlarged breasts or possibly a quaint goiter-like growth on my neck? The Dr. was so reassuring. He said the medical community does not even know exactly how the synthetic stuff works much less where it eventually goes.

The squirrel wars continue. Film at eleven.

Ike,Yikes!

My daughter sent me to www.wunderground.com where I viewed various maps of the current hurricane's progress. Ike looks as though it is a storm to be reckoned with. We kid about emptying the grocery store of eggs, milk, and bread when there is a prediction of a few inches of snow in St. Louis. We are never stranded for more than a day, so it seems kind of silly. If I were in Houston, however, I'd be scrounging for plywood and packing the van. We were there for six years, in Pearland, which is a suburb south of Houston. Never did we experience a hurricane and only once I remember our street flooding after some tropical storm. Sometimes we had to reroute ourselves to get to work or school due to flooding, but our house was never in danger. Since we moved away, my son had to once abandon a car because of flooding. I think that too was the aftermath of a tropical storm. But Ike looks serious and headed for Victoria. That is close enough to Houston to dump buckets of rain on the whole metropolitan area. I would think my son, who is in Cypress nortwest of the city, will experience torrential rains and pretty impressive rains even the 70 or so miles he is on shore. I guess it all depends on how fast the storm is moving. The slower it progresses, the more water it will get to pull in from the Gulf.

A Warning

Having been reared in a family that thrived on secrets, I am no stranger to denial. If the lie can be sustained, why bother with the truth? Let's pretend everything is wonderful. Such a rejection of unpleasant reality might be mistaken for optimism, but denial is more sinister than that. Regularly ignoring truth infects all involved with an insidious loss of equilibrium. Like looking through the wrong prescription of eye glasses, denial leaves some participants, especially the unwilling ones, always on the brink of nausea, straining to make sense of the distorted view.

I love your comments, Burton. I also know what you mean about various states of undress. Little kids don't have too much modesty or too much interest except out of curiosity. I never worried as much about nudity in a movie my children might see as much as I was concerned over violence. I do worry about how young some of the current models are. There were some ads in Rolling Stone back in the 90s that could have only appealed to pedophiles. It was Calvin Klein in the heroin chic era and there were a couple of half clothed about 12 year-olds as models. I stopped my subscription to the magazine and wrote to them about why. That particular campaign was discontinued--many people wrote--but lately I've noticed the same tendency creeping into various areas of advertising. Super thin models were in the news last year after a couple of deaths with global attempts to encourage actual caloric intake. Now more and more images seem to be just barely pubescent. Or else there are the role model celebs like Paris Hilton. Her visit to a local Macy's makes me question their quality as well as taste. Maybe mine is a larger resistance to the Madison Avenue attempt to hand me some prepackaged image I am to portray. I can only speak from a woman's point of view, but if this is liberation, I want nothing to do with it.
More on the whole feminism issue later.

Changes

I am attempting to make some changes in my life. At my age, cynicism tends to set in. You know, thoughts like "I've tried this before" or "what's the use?" pepper my world view. But I have found it is harder to give up on possibilities than it is to believe in them.

Another thought: Walking through Macy's today, I was accosted by lifesized picture advertisements hawking some new fragrance for Estee Lauder. They were artistic photos of women--one very, very young--half clothed in suggestively opened dress shirts. Eroticism oozed from the poses, which in and of itself does not offend me. But I read a commentor on my daughter's blog today who was puzzled by someone who wore a Tshirt blazened with MAN WHORE to a children's tourist site. I likewise was concerned about children like the eight year old boy shopping with grandma for school clothes or the ten year old little girl who is cutting through the department store with her mom to get to the mall and a book store. There was no channel changer or on-off switch, no way to close the magazine, and no way to avoid the EL display on that particular floor. As a composition teacher, I emphasize the importance of audience. I wonder to whom EL is attempting to appeal and if their marketers have forgotten that their displays appear in stores where families shop. Of course, I don't understand fragrance ads on TV with all their meaningful pauses either. Maybe I am just not an ideal consumer.

It is not a really big deal. But so many small changes in society have the effect of desensitizing us. I believe what I most resent is that media and advertisements and social mores are being refashioned by people, some nebulous group, who not only do not care about my opinion but also flat out refuse to consider what I think. They recreate the world in their images and I have to go along or drop out?

The Blahs

Blahhhhh. Much of today did not reach even that level of dissatisfaction. I am too tired to go to bed and too bummed to do much of anything else.
Faith, hope, love. . . all choices, huh? Must try, which reminds me of "must control fist of death." Anger is easier and so much more satisfying than blahhhh.
I did read a column in Newsweek today about making teachers accountable. I understand the theory, but like much of life, applying general standards and measurements nationally can not address the nuances of the advancement of the particular people involved in education. On the other hand, I think the SAT or something like it is necessary since students leave Wyoming to attend college in New Hampshire. It's the old apple and orange problem. Part of the trouble with measuring teacher success is the uncontrolled variable of the student. More about that another time. This is still rumbling around in my brain.

About Control

My daughter Colleen was musing about control of her life in her blog today. I still occasionally wonder whether I have control over my fate. The rest of the time I realize randomness rules which is maybe best. But maybe I don't believe in random. There has to be some plan along with reasons we all land where we do. It's just that no one has taken the time to send me the itinerary.

As I was looking at clip art circles to decorate this entry, I was reminded of conch shells and Fibonacci numbers. Maybe nothing is random, and that is why there is hope.

discovery

I wonder how many of us blog writers are sitting at metaphorical drugstore counters waiting to be discovered.

My Agenda Is . . .

I would be so refreshed and grateful to meet more people who either have no agenda or who immediately make their agendas known. I try hard to travel through life not second guessing motives of others and thus taking them at face value. I find myself often surprised at what they really mean or expect of me. Yet I believe the face value point of view works the best. I do not have the time or energy to spend on all that guessing. Walking on egg shells is no longer an option.

Favorites

Utilizing my Favorites when I opened the internet in order to get to this blog, I noticed the range of sites I have accumulated. Included on my list of Favorites are the following:

• my married daughter's blog
• a site about needlework
• something called Insurgent Country
• a site about Missouri sales/use taxes
• a source for Soduko

That's only a sampling. What would a shrink have to say about the combination? First of all, with so many, I obviously do not have the concept of "favorite" down. Then there is the proclivity toward both government and insurrection. Hmmm.

I must remember to smile. It's along the lines of the "acting as if" of 12 Step programs.

Against the Darkness

What happens when you write a blog that almost nobody reads? I have a blogger daughter who faithfully peruses my copy, and occasionally she will send her readers my way. She has made some wonderful connections via her blog, but alas I am a lone voice in a cyberspace wilderness. Is it my attitude? Could it be my personality creeping into the lines of prose? I have chosen not to lose sleep over this puzzle. I will instead read a few fellow posters and continue to rail against the darkness.

Let Us Pray

Awakening this morning to the new Killer B's: Bush, Breach, and Burke. It may not be the end of the world, but pessimism and change are in the air. Anheuser Bush may succumb to InBev. The Pin Oak Levy has been breached and Winfield is inundated. Archbishop Burke, the archnemesis of Catholics who think beyond legalism, is off to the Vatican. So many bishops, so few thinking men--who will be next to lead us back to pre-Vatican II? OOPS, my pessimism is showing. Maybe the gene pool of choices holds another mutation like Gregory. I must pray and be hopeful.

Ok, that was fun. My daughter created a mosaic in her blog and suggested readers try the same. It involves searches for key words on FLICKER. This is my result. The pics represent answers to 12 questions (my answers in blue):
1. What is your first name? Cheryl 2. What is your favorite food? popcorn 3. What high school did you attend? Notre Dame 4. What is your favorite color? red 5. Who is your celebrity crush? S.C. 6. What is your favorite drink? hot apple cider 7. Where would you go on your dream vacation? Strawberry Resevoir 8. What is your favorite dessert? spice cake 9. What do you want to be when you grow up? writer 10. What do you love most in life? learning 11. Choose one word to describe you? complicated 12. Your Flickr name? Wibbenmeyer--don't ask

Hum a Few Bars

Then there is music, something I need to incorporate into my daily life. Like praying and poetry, music helps me get in touch with myself. Music actually is praying and poetry, isn’t it?

Depressed?

Have you ever tried to convince yourself that you are not depressed? Such a loaded question. . .Obviously I have been depressed, so by admitting that, I may deny my own ability to recognize the condition in myself. Mental illness, you know. "Those" people do not always have all of their faculties intact, to loosely and badly quote J.D. Salinger. There is the conundrum. I begin to feel eerily drawn into Yossarian's world in Catch 22. And I detect a theme of not being able to win, no matter what (see June 5 below).

But I do not feel the inability to feel that accompanies depression. I am alternately sad, angry, stuck, even happy. Therefore, I declare myself not depressed. Now to work on that stuck thing, I need to motivate myself. Which should I choose, the carrot or the stick?

Some may jump to the conclusion that I am schizophrenic with so much talking to and about myself, but of course that diagnosis would be wrong on two counts. First of all, multiple personalities do not equate to schizophrenia. It was once called MPD for multiple personality disorder, but the latest label is Dissociative Identity Disorder. Secondly, I do not have more than one distinct personality. I have known people who have, and I am not that interesting.

Tuesday's Class

Tonight's class sucked. Maybe there is a more polite word but I doubt it would be as accurate. As a teacher, I need to take ownership of the classes I teach and that has not happened this quarter, at least not on Tuesday evenings. Not wanting to embarrass anyone involved (except myself), I will leave the description vague: I did little; some students likewise did little; a couple of students tried but fell short of expectations; some students did too much and respected too little; some students performed well in spite of the rest of us. All in all, it was mediocre but only in the sense of averages. Sometimes I think I do better as a student. It is a freer role.
Late night television, on the other hand, has cheered me on to throw myself back into life full throttle. Botox and a stomach band should do the trick. I am particularly drawn to the diagram of a stomach with the constricting band at the top. And it's adjustable, in case I were to lose height, I'm guessing.

Just Choose

There is so much I could do, but instead I live this life. Some days I just choose not to choose. I glance at the small artist's print on the shelf of St. Francis contemplating a skull and I consider his intensity. Maybe I should ask him to pray for me that I be likewise inspired. Then the slogan "Be careful what you ask for. . ." comes to mind.
I have been reading higher education propaganda again. It's enough to wring any passion right out of me.

And the Winner Is. . .Never Me

It occurred to me today that when I fight myself, I am always the loser. I have been doing a lot of that lately--fighting myself. I need to either find some other worthy adversary or else take up a less pugilistic hobby.

Some days just feel like I am trying to fill this bathtub. I know better but there it is.

Sunday

Father Cavanaugh was the homilist today. We get published authors, music writers, and all kinds of learned, sometimes famous Jesuits telling us what's on their minds. Today was about building on stone versus sand. Father introduced the homily by saying he had been thinking about this for a long time and he might not make sense. It would be stream of consciousness. I understood him perfectly. We were in sync, even with the slight overlay of fear that he would go somewhere political Terry would not want to go. It was a little like closing my eyes and and swaying while humming the tune to a familiar song. Later in the day I tried to share the thoughts, if not the feeling, with Terry, but I fell flat. The tune was just beyond my reach, so I stopped trying to hum lest I lose it all together. Maybe I will be able to sing it later after it bumps around in my head a while longer.

Charter is a Bad Word?

Two posts in one day. Better check to see if the sky is falling.
A nice young woman came to the door today and asked for my vote. She is running for local committeeperson in the Democratic Party. (For anyone who is unfamiliar with St. Louis politics, it is a one party system so everything is decided at the Democratic primary. Republicans and Independents basically do not count.) So this woman wants my vote in the primary in August. She was friendly and I appreciate her coming to my door. Part of her credentials included her children attending St. Louis Public Schools. (For anyone unfamiliar with the St. Louis School District. . .oh, never mind.) I told her my granddaughters attend City Garden that is becoming a charter school next year. She said that was a shame--not that they attended but that City Garden chose to go for the charter. She further explained that she is just so pro-public schools. So am I, sister, but the district sucks and the political atmosphere will not allow it to change for the better. Yeah, charter schools! Boo, entrenched and union saddled public schools where job security trumps student needs every time.

Fraud and Other College Opportunities

I read a blog today that is connected to a newsletter I receive about higher education. The woman was commenting students unprepared for college and she hit a nerve for (in?) me. Here is the comment I sent.
There are so many inherent problems in the school systems in the U.S. that I find it hard to focus on just one. First, when we talk about preparing high school students for college, we assume correctly that their earning potential will be severely limited without at least a two year degree. What good then is a high school diploma? If human resource people were honest, they might admit that the college requirement attached to some jobs is just a filtering agent rather than a true necessity for that level of employment. On the other hand, the high school diploma means so little today that employers want to know that a college experience has brought prospective employees to the point of at least being able to write complete sentences and to tie their own shoes. Second, as an adjunct and tutor at a community college, I have witnessed the repetition of courses in an attempt to remedy twelve years of bad schooling or else alleviate cultural and mental limitations often to no avail. I do not think I am exaggerating to call the developmental (read remedial) course load for some of the students a thinly disguised fraud. They are actively recruited and offered promises of being able to transfer to a four year school and complete a bachelor’s degree. All along, the community college willingly eats up the Pell Grants and other credit hour limited financial aid so that if a transfer ever does occur, there will be little monetary assistance left. It is not unusual for a student to have to pass five remedial courses, the two developmental composition classes and three levels of mathematics. That is a full semester of nontransferable credits (15 hours), and that number assumes none of the courses need be repeated. I am not even considering the returning students who take GED classes through the college and eat up some of the financial aid before ever being regarded as a college student. When the powers that be are confronted with the problem of the student who can not pass the developmental classes, the suggested panacea is either increased bandwidth or workshops to address learning styles. (I sat in on the process of sacrificing a new full time faculty position to buy the next best bandwidth package. At least the students will be able to check their hotmail accounts so the composition course will not be a total loss.) We even offer a freshman seminar that teaches students something about being in college, but the administration refuses to require the two hour class fearing the developmental students will complain about more nontransferable credit hours. Complaints=drop in retention numbers. So students already on the fringe of academic life are left to struggle on their own while some of us try to offer helpful hints about college life and responsibility during precious class time. Some who would have flourished or at least passed if exposed to the study skills and time management exercises in the freshman seminar class flail about for a semester or more failing two or more courses. Let’s see, two hours of preparation versus six or nine hours of repeated classes. It’s quite a system. Third (yes, I was enumerating issues), instead of a cell phone, get a library card, and instead of investing time and money in a bigger, flat screen television, read a book to a child. This is the toughest issue to address. We have full book cases in half the rooms in our home, so it is difficult to imagine a child who has no books to hold, no pictures to see, no text to hear so often it becomes rote. I cannot go into other people’s houses and force them to enjoy reading. I have some ideas, but I have rambled long enough. I just wanted to attest to the fact that at least some ill prepared college students were once blank slates upon which little was written by parents or by teachers in inadequate schools.
Boy, did you hit a nerve. . .

metaphor

Sitting in church this previous Sunday, it occurred to me that to be a Catholic, a person has to buy into metaphor. Think about how many gospel stories are just steeped in metaphor. Sunday's readings included a letter from Paul that spoke of the bread and wine being the Body and Blood of Christ but that also the participants in the Mass form the Body of Christ. so I was sitting there musing about how I am very willing to believe the Body and Blood of Christ is real in the Mass--no representation here but the actual physical reality. Then I started to question myself a bit. My take on the Mystical Body of Christ on earth in the physical reality of the Church is more to the metaphor side. And metaphor is representational. Some man says a woman is a fox and he means she has qualities of a fox. He knows she is not really the animal. So is Paul telling us that we are the Body, that as a group we do not just have qualities of Christness? If I say I am Christ to the world, I do not think of myself as God. We are trying to become divine. That is humanity's evolutionary path, but aren't we approaching that state rather than being in it? I think; therefore, I am confused.

I viewed some very conservative Catholic writing yesterday and was sharing something with my husband last night. One of the articles referenced some canon law and basically said that women should still be covering their heads in church. Through a series of illogical connections, the author asserted that the priest could be considered an angel in his role at Mass. So 1) out of respect, women should cover their hair, and 2) the covering serves to steer the priest away from concupiscence. My husband suggested we then need to cover the children. It took me a minute before pedophilia crossed my mind. I had to admit that was a pretty good observation.

It is maybe odd that I have never been angry at the Catholic Church over that scandal. I have reserved my ire for the specific fools involved in the illicit activity and then the cover-up. I even know the family of a young man who was eventually driven to suicide years after unresolved abuse. It saddens me and I think we, the Church, need to do everything we can to ease the suffering and correct the injustices. We have much penance to perform and prayers for healing. But I wonder if I am just not very surprised by portions of a hierarchy I have come to distrust in general.

There have been some particular nuns, priests, and bishops I have known who have been inspiring to me, but in the case of the bureaucracy as a whole, I have been unimpressed. Deaf and out-of-touch are two terms that come to mind. Do I sound arrogant? I don't know. But somewhere in my education in Catholic schools and a Catholic family, I concluded that each member is as much the Church as the next member. There are absolutes when it comes to morality, and I need an institution or at least a community to which to cling and in which to flourish. So being Catholic is woven into my life in a way that I would find leaving the Church almost impossible. However, bureaucratic corruption is also a reality. If pointing out that flaw in the Church makes me arrogant, so be it. Of course, I have a problem with authority in general. I'll save that issue for another post.

priorities

I just read my daughter Bridgett's blog entry http://south-city-musings.blogspot.com/and others' comments about Mt.Carmel High School's closing. It is a Catholic school in South Houston that Bridgett, her brother Ian, and I shared for a few years. They attended; I taught. It is one of those special bubbles in my life when I learned so much about myself. Bridgett caught the spirit of the place, as did a couple of her commentors: safe, diverse, imperfect. It was a wonderful incubator in so many ways for me and, I believe, for my children. It was the kind of place where lives could be nurtured and grown. Now that I have written that last statement, I wonder at how trite it sounds. I think the commentor who said he was left alone, not being ignored but in the sense of being allowed to stumble and find his way, was more on target. What a sad reflection of our church's priorities that such a place would not be worth saving.

Being Catholic

Although I have not been a faithful blogger, which has led to almost no comments, I wanted to share the following info in case anyone might be interested. I responded to a request by Speaking of Faith (NPR) for reflections on Catholicism. They have chosen to use some part of my interview on their program to be aired via broadcasting and podcasting beginning on May 1st.
My written comments from 1 April follow.
Today is my 57th birthday, and I am what some refer to as a cradle Catholic. So I have been through almost silent Masses, meatless Fridays, Latin readings, Communion by mouth only, Latin responses, to vernacular and guitar Masses with home baked unleavened bread and a shared cup of consecrated wine, the latter of which I believe to be Christ’s body and blood. One of the issues facing this church is whether I, as laity and woman, have the right to be even peripherally involved in our primary rite of Eucharist. I know I do, whether or not the male hierarchy has the grace yet to understand that. This issue, however, is only symptomatic of a centuries old conflict between legalism and love. Of course that is an over simplification, but there are those who go by the letter of the law, be it Biblical or church-made, and there are those who depend more on God’s mercy. We all call ourselves Catholic. My belief is in the mercy camp, and I envision God’s being puzzled over some of our squabbles about who can do what or whether sexual orientation or lack of Catholic Baptism might preclude holiness.
The reason I am still churched within the Catholic faith is community. Although individually we are imperfect, yes even the hierarchy, as a group we can be so much more and sometimes are. Today at Mass, the priest offered his thoughts about how each of us can be backed by community. That connected so well with what I had been considering for this reflection. He offered an example of a selfless act he had witnessed but would probably not have performed. Yet the attempt at the ideal happened and touched him. Maybe each of us cannot achieve ongoing perfection, but there may be an occasional ideal moment. I am not doing his homily justice, but I want to somehow explain what it means to be part of this group. The rotten apple analogy comes to mind—one spoils the bushel. But in the case of the Church community, the apple of a selfless act, a positive impetus, perfects the bushel, an imperfect group. So this sense of my community, one that is always becoming better than we defective members are, allows me to travel to a strange city and find some out of the way Catholic Church, and be at home. It does not matter if the priest preaches well or even if the congregants are friendly. I still belong and I know that deep in my bones.
I have seen beautiful cathedrals, representations of God’s Kingdom on earth, where wonderful choirs have filled the archways and resounded off the mosaics. My favorite image, however, of celebrating Catholic Mass is one my father shared with me. He was stationed in the South Pacific during World War II where accommodations were canvas rather than brick and mortar. He described acting as an altar server for a priest chaplain who celebrated the Eucharist on what was probably a mess tent table. Here was my shy dad thousands of miles from home, under threat of air attack, with men he hadn’t known at all just months before. Yet he was able to comfortably share in the rite. I find comfort in that same rite, the Eucharist, which makes me at home in some remote town, and in the community that is more than the sum of its parts. Thus I am assured that my being Catholic makes me Church, with a capital “C,” as much as any other member. Nor can I be very discouraged by any particular Catholic, no matter how egregious his sins or flawed thinking. My hope is that we continue perfecting. Although I am not well versed in the thought of the Jesuit Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, my understanding is that he believed we humans are evolving toward the divine. Now that’s Hope.

Energizers

Things that energize me:

• rainy days


• unexpected snow


• real conversations


• tear-wringing movies


• a child's belly laugh


• discovery of a connection


• some poetry
  
• crocus

Photo is by Ori Fragman Sapir and can be seen on www.treknature.com

Almost Two Months

Life just is not what one expects. Allow me to be more specific: life is seldom what I expect. Saturday will be three full months since I worked as a tutor 30 hours a week, taught a freshman writing class 3 hours a week and added the necessary hours of prep and essay critiques, and devoted every other Saturday morning to a job with no future and no chance for advancement. I wonder if I have recovered. The voice in this entry still sounds lost.

Too Bad

I am sorry that Fred Thompson has decided to bow out of the race. He was the one person who came close to my own beliefs. I had to be careful not to confuse his Law and Order persona with his political one, but I think I had it pretty straight. The media did not give him a very fair hearing. They did not seem to understand the more-than-sound-bite sentences he would use to explain himself. I guess no one told him about considering audience. Grade school children can only tolerate sentences of a certain length. Maybe the audiences created by media have the same limitations. So sad. There was a bit of Willie Stark (Talos) about Thompson in this race, the good, sincere part when Willie started out, before he began compromising himself. Now I can only guess if Thompson could have remained corruption free.

To Bee. . .

My daughter has a blog in which she has mentioned Bishop Braxton of the Belleville, Illinois, Diocese on a couple of occasions. He is not exactly Mr. Friendly and he has a way of spending on lavish surroundings. She has personal experience of the man at a Confirmation. I know him only by reputation. Two other men I know by their reputations are our current leader, Pope Benedict XVI, and the St. Louis Archbishop, Raymond Burke. I am frankly not sure about the pope. Take his recent cancellation of a talk at a secular university in Italy. Does he place faith above reason as the university's physicists, and an earlier speech when the pope was a cardinal, suggested? I would have to look into that further and count on translations. Then there is Burke and his excommunicating of Catholics who would not surrender their parish and its funds to the diocese, a tricky legal question. All three men irritate me. I have always seen myself as just as much the church as any of the hierarchy, but such letter of the law leaders still prove to be an irritation. They are just below the surface of my skin only occasionally flaring into break-outs. Braxton's most recent is his possible misuse of missions funds. Of course, that is not letter of the law, but I think the behavior exemplifies the problems we Catholics must face in our traditionally hierarchical organization.
I like what a nun told my daughter she had nicknamed the three men to whom I refer above: the Killer Bees. How fitting.

Inadequacy at Any Age

This evening Brain, from the televised cartoon Pinky and the Brain, pretty much summed up what I have been feeling lately: "I am middle aged and all I have to show for it is a sagging waist line and a roommate who thinks lint is a delicacy."

Higher Ed

I was reading an article on the Inside Higher Ed--Daily Update about the abundance of PhDs in the arts and sciences and the dearth of tenure track teaching positions. Once again, I am of two minds.
There is something about tenure that rubs against the grain. It is the permanence of the achievement that bothers me. At the community college I just left, I saw newly hired full time instructors (assistant professors? terminology may vary from institution to institution) working diligently to get noticed by longer termed faculty. The newbies would serve on various committees, offer the fresh insights, come up with ideas and follow through with same, infuse lessons with excitement, experiment with technology, and generally keep their departments moving. Personally, I always saw all the activity as partly inspired by the new opportunity and partly driven by the requirements of their tenure committees. The stark disparity between the newbies and some of the seasoned faculty was striking. Whining about committee work, oft expressed despair at students' inability to perform, entrenched philosophies, bullying, and worn lessons or the infamous newspaper-reading-while-students-work-on-their-own approach characterized at least a few of the tenured folks. Like unions, I am sure there was a good reason for tenure at one time, but I wonder if there is at least some abuse. When I read someone's complaint about not enough tenure track positions at the university level, I tend to think of what that protective bubble can produce, and the article begins to sound whiny.
On the other hand, or in my other mind, I comprehend the probems created by the ratio of full to part time faculty. Where I worked, that was 80% to 20% in both faculty and support staff. From what I have seen, that is not atypical. So a student at that community college had an 8 in 10 chance of getting an adjunct instructor after being advised by a part time counselor. The student might then check on financial aid and be helped by a thirty hour a week clerk who depends and a woman in accounting, a man in IT, and a registration clerk who are all part time. Once the student gets into the semester and needs help, she will get tutoring from a math specialist and do research with a library aide who are also limited in weekly hours. There is no such thing as prorated benefits for the adjuncts and only leave accrues for the part time employees. Of course there are wonderfully motivated people in all of the positions mentioned, but the chance of burn out, leading to poor performance and high turn over, has to be omnipresent. So the system is definitely broken. I'm just not convinced more of the same, more tenure track positions, would be the cure.

Impact

Just when did impact become a verb for anything outside of medical/dental circles? I had a professor in grad school back in the '90s who was already disgruntled by the word's use, so it has been working its way into everyday conversation for a while. You know what I mean. "The shooting impacted the neighbors." I get this mental picture of neighbors all shoved together in a garage for safety--like teeth in a jaw with nowhere to go. The use of impact as a verb, really shorthand for make an impact, has to be directly attributed to news anchors. Again, like transparency and closure, the word impact sounds just a little more important that it really is, like the speaker knows just a little more than the listener or at least is in the know. He or she is in the club. It is similar to all the academic types who loved shifting paradigms back in the '90s. But, back to impact, I think I would like to coin a term ala Bucky of Darby Conley's Get Fuzzy when he came up with "verbify." In his case, he was talking about just what I am, the misuse, creation, or manipulation of words into roles where they do not belong. I would like to add the term mediafy. The definition is to verbify but only when done by, or at least lead by, the media. So this whole impact thing falls under mediafication. I feel really smart and smug right now, but my head hurts. I think I'll have a lie down.

Splitting Infinitives

I love the English language. I love language of all sorts, the idea that we manage to communicate and sometimes get it right. Because I love language, I sometimes become protective of it. Although I like the idea of flux in grammar and words, what we have accepted in order to communicate well should not be treated frivolously. Some poetic license can be inspiring, but repeated, erroneous word use irritates me.
One aspect of word use that gets to me is overuse, often by the media, of a term that is supposed to be bigger than itself. One recent example is the word transparency when applied to government or industry. To demand transparency makes one sound so bloody cool. Let the Mitchell report on drug use in baseball exhibit transparency. That solves everything, doesn't it? If only all of politics were transparent.
Another overused, bigger than life term is closure. I do have sympathy for people who are caught on camera after losing a loved one to crime, at least the first time they are "caught" by the camera. I do wonder if there are a few ringers who travel from crisis to crisis to moan about what a good boy he was before he got into drugs, and, oh all we need is some closure. But today I was thrilled by the front page article in the St. Louis Post about the "closure" of Highway 40. At last, closure! Why aren't we all celebrating? Where are the toothless aunts and uncles and cousins who have longed for closure, never having only sought media attention for themselves? Now is the time to come out of the woodwork and dance on the highway. Enough of the nay-saying about traffic problems. We finally have closure.