Some People

Really are that dumb.

It staggers me to realize that some people don't WANT to know, they are happily, stubbornly ignorant and insist on staying that way to the point of viewing your efforts to inform them or expose them as an attack on their person.

I cannot believe it. and yet there it is, right in front of me. Walking, talking and babbling on at the mouth with a stream of nonsense.


ridiculous.

and by the way. even wild animals know that meat rots if you leave it around.

Learning

Slowly I learn more and more about Phtoshop. The potential of what you can accomplish is spectacualr. The amount I understand and can employ reliably is minimal.

On Stage

A few weeks ago, I was driving home from work and heard a radio announce for a singer/songwriter to perform in my town. This particular artist is a fav of HH and we have listened to her soulful tunes many a car ride. I quickly hurried home and snapped up tickets and then proceeded to work desperately at keeping this a secret from HH. I made it, Those who know me well will be shocked at this since i generally cannot keep a secret this well and if pressed will immediately spill the beans. THere are reasons I am not an international spy.

We arrived at the venue last night, in our weeknight finest, and she says "OH i know what we're doing". Now, I am a little sad but of course how long can you keep the secret? Till the artist walks on stage? probably not. We go in, get our 'real' tickets and stand around killing time until they open the doors. HH picks up a brochure on upcoming shows at the venue and lets out a squeal quickly followed by a frustrated " oh we missed it". I say...what? " Ayo is playing here..." and i say, "No Shit" since that is who we are there to see and she told me she had it figured out.

Yes, she hadn't figured it out and was thrilled to discover that we were in fact seeing Ayo together that very night.

and it was spectacular. What a talent and a true pleasure to watch perform. Such a fun personality and a real charm and wit.

Overall.... just a lovely concert.

sweaty toes

Some days are made for laying about and talking about silly things and walking on the ceiling, usually these days are a sunday. I think perhaps, those Sundays are the days to live for. The days that wash away the other days, the days that are long and lazy and lovely.

and so...

I am employed!
Just like that. I will be starting at a new elementary in the fall.


How do you like that?

Portraiture in the Grass

The heat has finally broken and so we spent a delicious mornign in the grass working on self portraits.

Laurens work pre teaching:


and post teaching:




As we can see a much more proportional image!!

she rules.

In personal news....not a lot really since I've been working since 6:30 Monday morning. When both my husbands go on travel my life just shrivels down into a singleparenthood mime. I did get a lovely night in with HH and that offset the isolation of motherhood for a few hours.

I am still waiting on schools to ring back, the good/bad news is that according to the several teachers I have consulted this is normal and it may even be another week or so before i might hear. I am going to another placement fair this weekend so we will see.

to eat or not to eat

So,

my health is not good, and has not been good in a long time. This is largely due to my diet as a vegetarian. I know this, we all know this and yet i mantain my status for no particular reason. Perhaps, I am thinking, it is time to give up the ghost and move into a different chapter of my life. A meat eating chapter.

i gave up meat 7 years ago on my return from Italy. I remember the last piece of meat I ate. I can still almost taste it. I love the flavor of meat and have been drooling over others meals for years. I have no moral misgivings about meat consumption, there is a food chain, and we are part of it and as far as the meat industry goes, I have no intention of eating meat that comes out of it.

I'm looking at CSA's.

I might just eat some chicken next week.

More of the Same

After being asked again yesterday if I had noticed that I was white, I came home in a bit of a funk, to say the least. The woman who asked was very polite about it but nonetheless informed me that I would have trouble in the classroom and was I afraid of african american children?

I am irritated.
I am saddened.
I am frustrated.
I am questioning myself.

This is not what I want out of a teaching experience, I don't want to be questioned not on my abilities as a teacher or as an artist but on my skin color. This is ridiculous.

I've spent my entire work history and training working with urban, diverse populations. I've read a bazillion books on the subject, lectured on the subject and am all around well informed. A principal I interviewed with yesterday was african american. This was her first year in an urban school. I can garuntee you she did not sit through this kind of questioning. I have more urban experience than she does.

Part of me is angry and proud and saying, F this. Part of me is worried for our future and saying, I'll show you.

I don't know which part is winning right now. I think the worried part because that's the part that always wins.



I just don't know.
My optimism is faltering.

The City

I went on my first interview yesterday, I have two more this afternoon. It was overall an unique experience, in that some of the questions I was prepared for and some totally caught me off gaurd and a few were the classic interview questions that somehow still surprised me. The most unsettling question was this: "Some of our students have never had a white teacher before and it will be an issue in the classroom, how will you respond when the children start to call you names?"

Now, having gone to Buff State and lived in Porter hall where I got called names every day for being white, that part is not the unsettling part to me. Nor is any real classroom management issue because I'm a hardass and I'm fine with that. I'm not sure exactly why I was surprised by the question but I realized that it had never occured to me that some children never have white teachers. Why this hasn't made it into my brain...who knows... but it just was a totally foreign concept. So I sat there like a stump for a few seconds, reeling at the new info before pulling myself together and giving out a good teacher answer. Then the principal asked me if I understood the question, at which point I faltered because I thought I had but now I wasn't sure. He rephrased and added a translation of what the VP had said since he assumed I hadn't understood the slang she used in her original question. I smiled and then without thinking said, " Listen, I know I'm pale but I still know what's going on". This caused the entire room to laugh and relax and that was that.

I haven't been reminded of my whiteness in a long time, not since school #3, where the kids assured me that I wasn't white, I was pale. This was a critical difference to them and I learned slowly what they meant by it. Now, it seems I must start again with children who have no experience with white people, this is a scary thought. Am I up to this task? Am I a good ambassador? Can I relate and teach them well?

This is a really intense experience for me and I am filled with qualms but also excitement because I do think I can handle this. HH is very unhappy about the situation and actually threaten to get 3 jobs when i told her I went through a metal detector to get into school. I tried to tell her that this will be true of all the schools but she is having none of it. She has also threaten to make me wear a flack jacket to work. I think she is exagerating.....maybe.

Goober and Rainbow

The other night HH and I drag our beleaguered selves to blockbuster to rent what should be a mindless adventure in film. Instead, we find ourselves, despite a self imposed 10 minute limit, stuck in "the line from hell" with two of the oddest clerks ever. Now this is including the girl who informed me that I didn't want to rent Southland Tales because "it bashes republicans". Here is clerk #1; a soft, doughy man of about 40-55 with a shapeless haircut to match his body and face. He is painfully slow at every process a clerk must engage in. Here is clerk #2; a short, sturdy man of about 20-28, with long ratty hair in a pony, a hair clip attached to his ear and many a rainbow bracelet circling his meaty arms. He also has a heavy, if unidentifiable accent.

Now, HH lets out a loud and terribly rude giggle and the appearance of clerk #2 and then I am forced to pretend as tho i have said something very witty and act all casual and not as tho my companion is laughing in clerks face. While we are controlling ourselves, clerk #1 seems to be having difficulty finishing the transaction he started back in the bronze age.

Clerk #1: hmmmmmmmmm this isn't working.....
he pauses to check behind him and then makes a great and slow show of staring up into the completely blackened night sky
Clerk #1: weeeell, it isn't raining out....
more sky searching
Clerk #1: it's not snowing either.....


Mind you, its June. Nice deductive reasoning goober, now move it along!!


Either way, the end result was thanks to the weather/ lack of weather/lack of wits the system failed to allow me to rent anything so we went home and watched the strangely compelling dog groomer reality show hosted by Jai of the Fab five. What has happened to his career, btw?