snap

I'm talking to myself...

Telling myself I had a very good weekend with JG sleeping over Friday, a Halloween party with Big A Saturday, and brunch with EM Sunday. 

Telling myself that I'm working hard at grading, prepping my regular classes + independent studies + the prison class + the Gaza class + editing the book. 

Telling myself that it's okay to feel anxious because there are plenty of reasons for anxiety...  I can even count off the reasons in every realm from the international, national, extended family, friends, family, physical... but I really am doing the best I can.

And also... doing that awful calculus of figuring out how many hours of sleep I can get if I fall asleep like right now... while the clock acts like an assshole countdown ticker... 

Pic: I spy a Great Blue Heron on the rapids of the Red Cedar.  From a long walk to clear my head early this morning.

evening report

you know this is Sunday anxiety

the lurch of the coming week 

sitting unsafe as dust before 

a wind

by the nail the night hangs on 

by the new day at the door 

I am trying to tell myself 

to remember

about how even stones support

each  other  like friends do 

in every wandering corner 

of the universe

_________________

Pic: Old neighbor BL's ethereal picture of Ellis Pond in Yellow Springs, OH. 

busy and strange

I threw on a mask for the second day in a row... I guess it's the season? Yesterday the queer students' alliance organized Masqueerade and I went to celebrate them. The older I get, the more delighted I am about every little sweet thing young people do. I'm so here for it. 

Today was our friends' Halloween party. Big A worked hard on his costume ordering things online weeks in advance. He is Adam Yauch (R.I.P.) a.k.a. MCA as Nathan Wind as Cochese in the Beastie Boys music video for Sabotage (1994). I kinda forgot all about today's party because I had a late work night, we had a house guest with whom I was up late, and then I had to prep and teach my Gaza class early this morning, attend a two-hour meeting where I was elected Secretary to The Michigan Academy of Science, Arts, and Letters etc. But I found the feathered mask that has been hanging on my mirror forever and a peacock-patterned wrap and went as a "strange bird." 

Pic: There's too much going on in this picture--it's so busy and strange and we're an odd pair, for sure.

women's ways

Everyone in a class earlier this week was familiar with the idea of "toxic masculinity," but we had to put some work in to figure out what it might mean for women and other people in male-centric spaces.  

As in how women may have to perform patriarchy and even misogyny in order to get ahead in the workplace. As in does female achievement on male terms equal feminism? As in if a woman leader values profit over human welfare or attacks another country, is it feminist just because a woman is doing it? Let's say... Margaret Thatcher. Sure she is the first woman to be Prime Minister in the UK, but can we count her as a feminist? 

I revisited some of those class discussions as I walked with AK this morning. One of the many things I absolutely love about AK is how she normalizes gentleness and softness in the workplace. She is the first person I know who signed a work email with "Love," and now I feel I can do that too. Her rapport with students is legendary and if there is an initiative to get the college to do better, AK is there in the lead. When I searched my blog for "AK" I found so many instances of why I'm just so lucky to know her. She said something so kind and funny mid-walk this morning, we just stopped to chuckle and hug. I'll treasure that moment. 

Pic: AK is running for office, and this is one of her campaign stickers. (I got her permission to use it here, but I'm going to continue to use her initials so this post doesn't show up in searches.) I LOVE how the "her" part of her name is sized up! 💗

(be)(holding)

after a  night  spent  begging

openness stays in my hands

alive and scrabbling  

the  half-seen things that stay 

behind my head like lunacy 

sappily live, laugh, love

  

 somewhere lives  resuming

in rubble--radio back, grow

high-pitched as news

I am empty-handed as those

not alive, I  re-collect them

in the lateness of my love

_____________

Pic: I didn't get pictures of the Northern Lights or the Comet last week, but I've been very lucky with sunrises this week...

the young(er) guy I married...

is now 51! How does that happen?! It seems like just yesterday when turning 30 was such a big deal :). And now here we are with grown-up kids ourselves. 

Happy Birthday, Big A!!

We had dinner out with the kids and then dessert and presents at home. I made a pineapple upside-down cake (birthday request) that turned out perfectly. (I subbed freeze-dried raspberries for maraschino cherries as At has allergies.) And the Fireclaw I drove to pick up yesterday was a BIG hit! (Nu wanted one too!) 

Socrates on my mind

Well, Socrates was on my mind this morning because I had to drive over an hour on my way to work to pick up a present for Big A's birthday and the town I was picking up from was named "Hemlock." The only reference for hemlock I've ever had is that it was the poison used to execute Socrates in prison. (Why did they name their town that?!?)

And that was the other reason I was thinking about Socrates--prison. Because today was my turn to be in the classroom with the incarcerated students. I'd picked pieces that had been written in prison as readings for today (by Malcolm X, Dr. King, Mandela, O. Henry...) and planned to talk about what each of the authors was in prison for, and how long they'd been unpopular in the public sphere. (It still freaks me out that nearly 70% of White Americans disapproved of Dr. King the year before his assassination and that Nelson Mandela was on the U.S. State Department's list of terrorists until 2008.) As it turned out, my background check didn't come through in time, so I didn't get to go after all and my visit has been postponed to December (maybe?).

I was so disappointed. I know Socrates isn't considered a stoic, but stoicism is what I should aim for right now? (Also, it might help me fall asleep? It's 4:36 am... when will I sleep tonight?)

Pic: My reward for driving along Michigan rural roads early this morning was this aureate sunrise.