sunrise-sunset

Graded like a maniac. Shepherded students through their first conference submissions process. Worked on getting all the grad school recommendations out. And I have just one more review letter to complete... I'll have three more due in January, but I'm not going to worry about that now. 

After all the service-y stuff, I really hope I can get back to writing and editing on my own project this week. It's time. And also--more importantly perhaps--there's a deadline.

Pic: The sky above me near sunset (beautiful). Max and Huck alongside me going about their potty business (not so beautiful). We don't have many windows on the west side of the house, so if I'm not outside, I'm likely to miss the sunset. I'm so grateful to Max and Huck for this sunset and everything else too.

DND

After krampus-ing hard yesterday, JN declared this a DND (do nothing day). I guess it works as a "Do Not Disturb day" as well. I love it. I'm going to use it. Someday.

Final grades are due soon, so it wasn't really an option to do absolutely nothing. But I built lots of nice stuff into the day--I got a massage, I went on a ramble with L, a long walk with Big A, then family dinner with At.

It was DND lite.

Pic: Goodbye from the puppet theater. My parents gave the kids this puppet theater when they were little--I think Nu was less than two years old. It showed up to lots of birthday celebrations and we accumulated quite a collection of hand puppets and finger puppets all put to great use by the "narrOator" (At's version of "narrator" 🙂💗). It lived in the rumpus room for a long time and then in Nu's Room for years. But for a year now, it's been hanging out in the upstairs hallway because no one wants it. I've known it should go to another house where some other kids can love it, but it was a bit difficult letting go as it bears so many memories of the younger versions of my kids, my parents, me... 

Anyway, when At came to dinner this evening, I got a few last pictures of them together at the puppet theater. I'm lucky my kids are so indulgent.

skin, hair, fur

Every night before he leaves for work, Big A has taken to reminding me to let go my feelings of overhwhelm and weltschmerz and focus on the things I can control. In the last two months, I've been staying up later and later... doomscrolling and breaking out in hives and acne and literally pulling my hair out (trichotillomania).  

Skin: So this week, I finally got to see a dermatologist who put me on tretinoin cream. Let the record show that I asked Big A to write me a prescription for tretinoin a month ago and he recoiled and refused as though I had asked for opioids or something and made me wait.

Hair: For my very gross and unattractive habit of self-induced hair loss, I ordered an OTC nutritive supplement.

Fur: Months ago, JN decided to be a Krampus for Krampus Nacht and asked if I would be their handler. It was still a bit of a surprise to see "Maya: Krampus Handler" on the organizing committee's list of duties. I didn't want to leave home this evening, but also didn't want to stand JN up, so I did go. It was small "f" fun.

Pic: A crowd of Krampuses in Old Town. I was so out of it, I wasn't in the least bit scared. 

"praying for peace/living with love"

The world is so beautiful and the world is so terrifying. Over 17,000 people have been killed by bombs and gunfire in the past eight weeks... It's so strange how I still go about as if everything is ok... Although my country vetoed a humanitarian ceasefire yet again. 

I think of the children holding a press conference in English--a language foreign to them--to beg the world not to bomb them. And yet, over 7000 Gazan children have been killed in just these two months; many thousands more are maimed and injured for life. I think in particular about the mother holding her lifeless baby saying she took 580 IVF injections to have him; the tender searchers in the rubble after every airstrike. I think of how many hospitals, schools, and homes have been bombed, the patients, medical staff, students, teachers, and families in them evanesced. No poem can contain my grief. Nothing can calm my disbelief that this is happening so publicly... so blatantly.

Sunny Singh, who has always been so kind to me and my students lost a friend today--he was a fellow teacher of English and a poet. His name was Refaat al-Aareer. In a better world I might have met him some day at a reading or a conference or in someone's home. And he is just one of thousands who is gone suddenly and too soon with their hopes and dreams still pending. This is a poem he wrote last week:

If I must die

you must live to tell my story

to sell my things

to buy a piece of cloth

and some strings,

(make it white with a long tail)

so that a child,

somewhere in Gaza

while looking heaven

in the eye awaiting his

dad who left in a blaze-

and bid no one farewell

not even to his flesh not even to himself-

sees the kite,

my kite you made,

flying up above

and thinks for a moment an angel is there bringing back love

If I must die

let it bring hope

let it be a tale

_______________

Pic: Baker Woods with RS yesterday. She asked me if it would look bad if she celebrated Hanukkah with all that is going on. I told her we'd be lighting lamps with Nu (Big A's great grandparents were Jewish and there is a family menorah/hanukkiah). I'm glad we have celebrations. I want us to put away our bombs and celebrate life. (I saw the words I used for the title of this post on a church's marquee this morning on my way to work.)

"in a hole in the ground..."

I'm so, so, SO excited. 

Whether it's because I'm a water sign or because I grew up in a city with one of the longest shorelines in the world, I've always loved water. (And this despite being a bad swimmer.) I like looking at water most of all, and I think sunlight on water is the most magical thing ever. 

So I've always gravitated to homes near water, and when we lived on the Pine River in our previous home, it was the happiest I've ever been--with the view (not the rising cost of the home insurance for that place). I was glad our current house has a tiny pond, but I've been wanting to enlarge it forever. And this week, we finally did! 

We dug in a not-straight line and around existing trees and shrubs, and it turned out a bit... crescent shaped? heart shaped? 

Pic: Our tiny pond in the foreground, and the "hole in the ground" (Big A) we've dug. Now to line it, fill it, and enjoy it.

another love poem

my class is united by laughter
until we look alike 

                            it digs a hole in the day where 

                            our anxiety disappears

as if sifting through our souls

for the answer

                            and finding only half words

                            and silly dreams

freed us forever/for a moment

(or so it seemed)

______

Pic: First-year-seminar poster exhibition. The moment I'm thinking of was in another class, but the picture I took there has too many recognizable faces, and I haven't asked for permission to post it. I'm glad the semester is almost over... but I will miss the camaraderie and intellectual tussle of the classroom. Sending extra love out into the universe for the young ones and the little ones today.

AJLT

And just like that, it's exam week: I wish I could tell my student people to take deep breaths. Lots of last-minute anxiety, so the days are long, but overall a sense of satisfaction and good endings.

It was the kind of day where I constantly pivoted like a dancer: from sharing the first years' sense of accomplishment in the morning (their first semester at college down, look at the posters they made!) to making notes as students presented on projects they've been working on for six weeks (and marveling at their insights and how skilled they are at encouraging each other!) to a discussion with the college's board of trustees in the early evening (just the department chair and me, we thought it went well). 

That last task reminded me that someone put me on a list of nominees for the MSU board of trustees. When I demurred, EM said (referring to the spate of Title IX missteps at MSU since Larry Nassar) I was totally worthy because at the very least I wouldn't sexually harass anyone. Well, in that case... 

Pic: Amaryllis are blooming in my tea garden. Time to go start the narcissi so they'll be in bloom by Christmas (I say, hopefully).