Brighter

It's been a super rainy week... so last week's picture of my ecocriticism students in the sunshine, ID-ing trees blindfolded is a needed reminder of brighter, happier, more productive times.











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In solidarity

I unintentionally fell asleep downstairs last night...

And when I woke up, I saw that three of my loves had decided to sleep right there with me.

#LivingRoomCampOut!









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Accidental Portrait #2

Huckie, too, is horrified by CNN.

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Accidental Portrait

And apparently, I spend my life being terrified.

Perhaps I had just spent time reading the news?


#MSU







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Call this nosey

When mama's cooking and the smells are driving us wild:



But that's all I have.

I wish I had a picture of the Indian feast I made for KB and her students who were on their way to the temple for navaratri and garba.

But to see the two students from India enjoying my version of Indian food was particularly special! And KB sweetly took back a box of biryani for At--the half-Indian kid who couldn't come.
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Hustlers, Sitters, Us

This is Huckie modeling how I felt after watching Hustlers. Super down and bewildered.

IDK why, but I was expecting more Robin Hood, more lighthearted women's camaraderie and sisterhood, more of Adam McKay's socialist take on the 2008 crash, and less... pole dancing and poisoning?

Big A and I had booked a babysitter for four-hours via a local agency, but he knew I just wanted to come home, so we did--an hour and a half early. The sitter was great, came with planned activities, was cool with the puppies, and generally cool. The next time, I hope Big A and I pick a more fun activity for ourselves!




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Candid Lecture

The president (of the college) posted this to social media this morning.

I'm supposedly giving a community talk on "invitational rhetoric," although it looks like I'm demonstrating how to go into "bear mode" 😂 







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"Portrait of the Puppy as a Naughty Dog"

Huck isn't allowed up to the library without a human, but she always finds a way to get up there for the sunbathing and getting a little closer to where her dada is napping...
















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"All dressed up with nowhere to go"

Somehow, someone had a bit too much time on their hands after grading and class prep early this morning.

I chuckled as I wrote the title, because when we "translate" puppy talk, we call their harness a "dress."

But now I've reminded myself of how Koko used to call her collar a "necklace" and am sad...

And clearly the puppies don't like this game either.



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It's cruel

When your child can drag so many of your cultural heroes at the same time and loves it so much that they send you this pic on Twitter and family chat...

#JustinInBlackFace #OldSchoolKanye










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A New Way

I usually snake through buildings and alleyways in the general direction of Grand River Road to get to class, and today I came upon this loveliness when I turned some random corner from Farm Lane.

Maps (and recipes) are more notional than instructive for me, so I just hope I can find this park again when I head back in that general direction.




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I can't live with or without you...

"cuddling"

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All because of a gown

I was thoroughly charmed to receive an email from our young alumni awardee, an Oxbridge D.Phil who currently works in Oxford, saying they'd seen my D.Phil robes at convocation and asking if we could meet for a chat to talk about our Oxford connections. They showed up at my office with a packet of McVitie's HobNobs and we had the nicest, longest conversation I've had with stranger ever.

Current state:



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Tea for Toes

I was supposed to go to a community reading of Sachiko and a yoga hike with LB and CF yesterday, but I'd messed up and yesterday was also the day Big A had noted on the family calendar that he planned to take his grant grantors to dinner. (I'll admit to completely taking for granted that Big A won't go out in the evening unless I make him...)

Nu and I were playing cards when CF popped by to give us a hug before she headed home. And then we were all sitting cozy, cuddled up with puppies, a teapot of peppermint tea, extra cupcakes from a birthday celebration at work, and the first episode of Derry Girls cued up, because we wanted CF to see it.

When I thought no one was watching me, I applied my hot tumbler of tea to my sore toe and when I looked up, Nu and CF were doing the same to their feet. I'm chuckling now remembering them both murmur "mmm that feels nice..." My intergenerational posse!

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A Place Called Home

What you can do when your classroom is in the building right next to the art museum... 

Katrín Sigurðardóttir's "Unbuilt Residences" fit perfectly with the Robert Young passage that begins "You find yourself a refugee..." and so we did a little tour in the last twenty minutes of class yesterday.

#MSUBroad
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A Moment

I don't know how, and at the end of today it seems incredible, but this was part of my morning.

Afterwards was on two different campuses, teaching, attending meetings, getting stuff for care packages. And after that was blessedly bliss--eating Subway in the rumpus room, chortling along with the last ep. of Derry Girls, and getting my poor foot (Meijer-grocery-cart-drive-by victim) rubbed down with lavender oil by Big A.



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Sometimes...

 
...the universe throws a message at you and just have to go with it:
















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Yes

Noobs and I finally made it to the bookstore after panning to for literal days, and I'm beyond excited to start this book.

And also, how awesome is that bookmark (and the kind bookstore person who just gave it to me)?!

Weekend Sibling Summary (Hello and Goodbye)

Weekend:

First this:

Then this:

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Come From Away

The fam caught the show with J. How strange that we get to see it the week of 9/11!

The kids and I thought it was sweet,  and Nu and I listened to a few songs later. But I could sense Big A's irritation all show long--it was kind of low-key amusing.

On the walk back, Big A (rightly) complained about how one of the few people of color in the show was made to "talk like he was from Wakanda."

The kids and I were chuckling over this, and one of them said so *kindly and indulgently* "Dad's kinda cynical, no."

Yes.

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Mood

Sometimes you need a cuddle from someone who knows they're a good boy to get through mucky weather, a cruddy cold, mom delayed at work meetings, and Friday the 13th...











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International

I'm loving how many new international students we have now!

#OnceAn InternationalStudent #AlwaysAnInternationalStudent









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The Only Plane in the Sky

 

I'm usually wary of 9/11 and the way it can be weaponized against people of color, but today I was listening to Garrett M. Graff talk about his oral history. He rightly made the point about how it was the second plane that destroyed American innocence since apparently, everyone including Robert Mueller assumed the first one was an accident.

It was the sheer randomness of death, however, that was crisis-level terrifying. He tells a story of someone who went back to his hotel room at the Marriott to change his shirt so he could wear the tie a colleague had just given him... and he survives, while the colleague who went on to the meeting  he was expected at, in the second tower, does not.

A dear student's sibling passed away (after we had just talked *about* them just a few days prior) so this thing has been on mind a little extra these weeks...
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One thing leads to another...

I really love what the new rug does in my office, but it's making me feel all the clutter in the corners extra fiercely...












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While I was sleeping...

three members of my family went out at midnight for drive-thru nachos...
these photos (shared to family chat) tell that story:

       

Drumline

On our walk yesterday, L and I chanced upon the drumline practicing for their big performance at the game. And eventhough we don't really follow college football, it was charmingly impressive.  

The plan was to shower and get into my jammies for the rest of the day in order to recover from the week that was week #1. 

And, I [drumroll] did.  

Mostly, anyway. 

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Saturday!!

Woke up this morning, peacefully, sans alarm, after slumbering with the three babies in the rumpus room. (I can spy the human baby on the landing.)

I had been waking up with dread and a ready-made headache in the early morning dark most days this week, so this was a welcome change of pace.







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Cocktails with Goats

That's what DD's invite promised and that's exactly what she delivered. Apparently, it was exactly what I needed at the end of a difficult first week back at work.

Daisy, Rosie, and Lily are master clowns and ace therapists.








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Too Much

Just when I think I can't anymore, I glimpse another joy, other possibilities, the beginning of hope...

















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Right

Is there something more purposeful to my stride when I'm on MSU campus on teaching days?

It feels like it.











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First Day

Start of term-time at Alma. I got in on time, did the usual things (the challenge about my name, helping people find odd affinities, class work, etc.)

My first day is fairly light, but I was so exhausted by the end of the day... as my colleagues remind me, this is a "reentry" after the sabbatical.






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Labor Day/Boss Day

We had no plans for Labor Day, so armed with a hardcore DSA poster, an excellent batch of biriyani, an ironic floral/pastel mug meant for someone's grandma, and all the baby sibs, (who address him as "Nana" in the one word of Telugu they do know), we made the trip up to Alma for At's Boss Day. I love my babies. The babies will save us.

Nine miles of pavement

alone but with thoughts and lyrics
the whistle and whoosh of traffic

I can imagine the uplift of impact
almost feel I might be able to fly

Saturday at Alma

Spent this Saturday in retreat/orientation with the new MacCurdy women. We got some new furnishings and tees with the last of the budget last year, elected house officers, made plans for a year of programming, and started a statement to change "women's house" to "women-presenting and women-perceived." All in all, a rather busy two days. On to classes...









Nu came along to Alma for the day, and hung out with At helping make posters and eat pizza at his  DSA event...

Fall is creeping in

See top left

#RadiologyGardens

#Daddy'sBirthday

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Unclear Condition

Morning is manic fog
milky, vanishing, slipping
under cereal, hugs,
reminders, lists,
all the things
we must bring

they are literal--Driving
the littlest human
to school and...
you know what?
they say...
that may be frost

just ponds of them
hanging out in the fields
with horses, ducks
the littlest human watches
my face cautiously
for a trace of panic

Fog flaps in the wind.
like blankets, begins to
put this year to bed. I
wonder where the sun will be
this time, next year--
and will we be here

Choices

If I focus on the sparkles set off by my new mobile and not the murky window behind it, perchance I'll get through this term brilliantly?

#Self-bribery #StartOfClasses






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Big A and Bebes

Our new term-time normal, I guess.


The show-off-y corn behind Big A is his too. 









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Away they go...

Nu's hamming it up in their first day of school outfit.

Also, it was the first time I publicly tried out the gender-neutral pronouns Nu had requested.















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Tiny tomato

School starts this week, and this tiny tomato in my planter box is the culmination of some of the best moments of the summer: The outside; children's laughter, water-fights, reading; sunshine; Huckie content in the sun; Scout instigating me to chase him...

Hello school year!






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Coping

We were on our way to Harry Potter Night at the Lugnuts game (A A-D-S's birthday celebration)...

Nu cried twice before we even left the garage. At was packing for college. Nu sprinted upstairs for more hugs and came back to the car feeling a bit better.

I had a headache all evening, was crying as we pulled into our street, and full-out bawling by the time we rounded the bend in the driveway and his car was gone... He was supposed to leave in the afternoon, but kept getting delayed, and I think I kinda hoped he'd still be there...

Big A is in YS for LH's funeral service, so Nu and I had a sleepover with the puppies in the rumpus room.

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Faerie

L suggested that I take Nu on a fairy tour later this weekend to cheer her up after At leaves for college.

Noted.

#RadiologyGardens










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Getting Stuff Done

Puppies are groomed; Nu's broken glasses are replaced (super cheap and super quick at L.O.); Nu's Doc Martens are bought; the random and weirdly suggestive license plate (0690) has been exchanged; the syllabuses are coming along...

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Tough Mother

I kept thinking back to our weekend walk today.

I had SIX meetings at school, and wouldn't get back until really, really late. The first meeting was the Title IX interview and I was hoping it wouldn't drown me in all the fear and sadness talking about the bullying brings up.

I think I did ok at the other meetings. It helped that I started and ended the day with CF's support and had JG's hugs to look forward to in the afternoon.

I get by with a lot of help from my friends.

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Sighing for those skies

Summer is slipping by: my days, the skies, children's hugs... everything is set to change.

I have to remember I've made it through the school years and winters before...










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