The Joy Narrative - Day 3

Hot chocolate, an hour of free time, and a friend. 

Yesterday I had the chance to catch up with a friend.  LV and I went to grad school together, but we also work together now.  We share an office.  Simply because we share an office doesn't mean that we have a lot of time to catch up.  Quite the opposite in fact.

Somehow yesterday provided us the unique opportunity of an hour.  When I realized that LV and I had some free time AT the same time, I put my grading down.  She asked if I wanted a cup of hot chocolate as she was making some for herself and I agreed.  The day yesterday was sunny and cool outside our office window.  It's fall here in Forest Grove and the trees on campus were celebrating with a fireworks display of yellow, orange and red. 

I followed LV down the hall to the teacher's lounge with my travel mug.  As we waited for her plug-in kettle to warm up, we began talking about our classes and our students.  The dialogue began as it usually does, a couple of complaints about too many papers, not enough thought, etc.  But because we had the space of an hour, we slipped deeper into the conversation than we normally do.  We found ourselves talking about the intent of education and the necessity for new models, new paradigms that rely on creative thinking rather than standardized testing.  It was one of those conversations that is fueled by the passions, that is a true call and answer, a meeting of the minds and I found myself "high" from it.  Maybe it was the hot chocolate.  Whose to say?

We didn't necessarily solve anything through our discussion, but we rediscovered something about why we teach, about why we love it, and why it is important, and the process elicited a joyful sigh.  LV soon had to depart and she made her way out of the building.

I was left alone with my reflections and I felt good about myself, about my place in the world, in my work, and what I give to my students.  I put on my iPod, closed my office door, and danced a little bit before I sat down to grade the rest of my papers.  I found that they went quickly and I was more readily able to see the potential nestled in their thinking/writing. 

Hot chocolate, an hour of free time, and a good friend altered my perspective, shifted my mood, lifted me up a little bit.  It's what friends are supposed to do.  I simply hope that as LV walked out of Berglund that day, weighted down with her baskets full of papers, that the load felt light and a song bounced around the back of her head.

Clint McCance

I know I was supposed to dedicate this week to the Joy Narratives, but this issue came to my attention and I couldn't help but do my part to spread the word.

Recently, an Arkansas School official posted a Facebook post in response to Spirit Day.  A day where people were supposed to wear purple in support of homosexual teens.  The vitriol and hatred present in this post was despicable.  McCance even called for all homosexuals to kill "thereselves".  This is a man who makes decisions that control the education of young minds.  In my opinion, this kind of individual is the most dangerous sort of person to have in control of curriculum.  He should resign immediately.

I can't fault him for speaking his opinion out loud.  Most times people who feel this way are dictated by shame and fear of social retribution.  I think if there is any chance of eliminating this kind of prejudice we have to allow these people to speak their minds so at least their thoughts exist in the public domain.  McCance at least stands by his convictions and lets people know his bias.  His comments should spark a dialogue, an exchange between people that discusses the value of a life, EVERY LIFE, and how harmful these kinds of comments can be to young minds. 

I won't even begin to discuss the grammar of the post itself.  This from a man in charge of education?!

For more information on the situation, you can follow this link.

The Joy Narrative - Day 2

Tomorrow is comic book day.  Today I'll be on the Internet looking up previews of comics that come out tomorrow.  The comic book companies release four- to five-page previews of the new titles a couple of days in advance.  I could simply wait until tomorrow to read the first pages of the books I collect, but I can't help myself.  I want those stories.  I want to keep up with Green Lantern, Cyclops, Wolverine, Storm, Rogue and X-23.  I love these characters.  I have followed them now for almost two decades.  I've grown up with them.  I've developed a deeper sense of story by reading theirs.

I'm a writer.  I'm bound to love stories, but there is something unique about comic books, about the blending of image and text that...morphs the form into something new and exciting.  Some will say it is all violence and cartoon women with big breasts, but it is more than that.  For example, the core titles I collect are the X-men line.  While the X-men are about high adventure and pulp fiction, the comics are also about family, alienation, courage and heroism, growing up, and finding your purpose in the world.

In much the same way that generations have grown up with the Bible as a source of morality, so have I grown up on the lessons of the comic book world.  More often than not, you will find the characters in comics driven by an inner sense of purpose, forced to question the limits of their own morality and how that morality translates into action.  I think they serve as the modern day fable, the parable.  They can be used as a barometer of culture.

When Captain America was killed a couple of years ago, it felt right.  There was something present in the culture at that specific juncture that made it seem appropriate that a symbol of American patriotism should be assassinated.  In fact, he was assassinated by one of his own (the plot thickens).  Well, since then he's been resurrected in typical comic book fashion, but that too reflects on what is happening in American culture.

Many people scoff at my fetishistic pleasure in comic books, but there is something real and tangible underneath the sci-fi/fantasy.  The metaphor of power translates in very real terms into a life lived on this plane.  I love them and I hope to keep that little kid inside of me alive for as long as a I possibly can.

The Joy Narrative - Day 1

The other day I made a quick blog post on dancing and how much I love it.  I felt great afterward and I began thinking about how I need to focus on things that bring me real joy.  So, I decided that for one week I would try and write exclusively about things that made me happy.

Today?  My dog, Neera.

Tracy and I were living on a piece of country property when we got Neera as a puppy.  She's the daughter of a pound rescue.  We don't know much about her breed but it's fairly obvious that she's at least a little bit lab.  She's had her problems.  She's been attacked by other dogs, raccoons, and skunks.  She's dog on dog aggressive and so she's not exactly a dog park dog, but she's sweet with our little girl, has been since Shea was a baby.  She loves to snuggle with me and there are many nights when I fall asleep with my arm over her and the smell of her fur filling my dreams.

Each and every day we run her outside.  We grab the Chuck-It and toss the tennis ball for her.  She rips around the yard like a shadow.  She's fast as hell and she'll play until she pukes.  She's getting on eight years old now and lately Tracy and I've been noticing a little bit of slowing in her.  We have many good years left with her and for that I'm grateful.

Even as I'm sitting here typing, Neera is lying next to me on the couch.  She curls up next to me when I work and waits for me to go to bed.  Tracy gets frustrated at times because she wants Neera to keep her company until I go to bed, but the dog often winds up posted up next to me.  I scratch her ears between grading essays and if it gets to late she whines and tells me I need to go to bed.  She's like an alarm clock in reverse. 

For many of you these posts will be the least interesting of my posts, but these are the things that lift me up in a day.  When I get home from work and my dog greets me at the door with an overly enthusiastic hello, well, I light up a little.  She's a part of our family and she brings me comfort and companionship and that coveted emotion...joy.

Dance

Lately, I've been on a pop/R&B/rap kick.  I'd like to say I don't understand it, but I know exactly why I've been listening to this type of music.

I LOVE TO DANCE.

Trust me when I say this is not the most comfortable admission for a married, 30-something, white boy father.  I don't have moves.  I'm not altogether graceful, but what I don't have in natural ability I make up for in joy.  That's right...joy.  It brings me joy to dance.  I've been CRAVING a wedding lately.  I want someone to get married so I have an excuse to get out there and dance.

I'm sitting here right now listening to "4 minutes" by Madonna, Justin Timberlake, and Timbaland.  I have them on headphones so the rest of the house doesn't wake up, but I have the volume cranked and I got the head bobbing, the foot jumping and I feel like I could be compelled out of my seat at any moment.  I could stop writing in the middle of a sentence to go bust a...

Rough Drafts

One of my writing classes is handing in rough drafts tomorrow.  I'm not going to edit them.

I'm sitting here feeling guilty about this.  I've never had students hand in an essay without helping them with their drafts...ever.  I'm officially cutting them loose to do it on their own.

The reason I'm doing this is because I'm auditioning the concept.  Lately I've been talking with other teachers about their process and almost none of them comment on rough drafts.  I believe in the process I've used over the last couple of years.  I've seen improvement, real improvement, in student writing, but I can't maintain.  I've commented on every students' rough draft on every essay assignment for every semester since I've begun teaching.  That means I have marked 1320 essays in the last three years.  It's exhausting.

So, I'm going to let them do it on their own.  I'm going to see if there is a significant difference in the quality of their finals.  I'm giving them a page and a half worth of peer review questions they will have to answer (single spaced) and I'm giving them until next Wednesday to complete the final.

I have to do this.  Something has to give.  The class I'm doing this with has received my feedback on six different occasions.  That only includes major essay assignments and not the blog assignment or other prewriting activities.

I know this post is a giant justification.  It's me working past my guilt.  I'm hoping it works.

Sleep

My love affair with sleep is a tumultous one.  We are lovers in the latin sense: fiery, passionate, unpredictable.  We can spend hours together in bed one day and then not be on speaking terms the next.  Our ups and downs are conflicts of legend, battles between good and evil, mythic conquests where I, the hero, try to tame the beast, to control its elusive powers through domination and force of will.

Other times, I am the sycophant, the pleading worshipper, begging for attention, desperate for its return.  I am the sailor's wife on the widow's walk overlooking the sea wishing for my lover's safe return.  I am desperate with worry that I won't be reunited. 

I am the worried parent in the night, ear pressed to the monitor, listening to the sick child's rasping, the sputtering and coughs through the night, the low moans and whistles, the sickness percolating in her lungs, a science project gone awry.

Other times, sleep is the void.  It is emptiness and nothingness.  It is the moment after world's end.  It is the moment before creation, it is absence and blackness. 

I think sleep and I need couple's counseling.