'Tis (Still) the Season

For many of us, the wrapping has been wadded up and thrown out, the food has been feasted on, and the family time has worn a little thin.  Some toys have already broken and gift recipients have braved daunting lines to exchange whatever was the wrong size, color, shape, make, model, brand, title, or sound.  The battle cries of "Happy Holidays!"---"No, it's Merry Christmas! I'm keeping Christ in Christmas!" have settled back into murmurs of quiet and fairly content napping. 

That last part gets me a little.

I don't understand why so many of my fellow Christians get bent about what kind of greeting another person gives them; no one can take Christ from us---it only makes US seem like WE are bound and determined to take away someone else's religious or non-religious observance.  That's not what this country is about.  Indeed...it's not what the Christian faith is founded on.

We need to remember more than the birth of Christ, which we are celebrating at a random time of year in the first place, since no one knows when He was born.  We need to remember the LIFE of the man who is our role model not just at the Christmas season, but at every season.

We must remember that we are commanded to love our neighbor as ourselves---in every season.  It's easy to be nice with carols in our heads and sparkling lights everywhere.  It's not so easy to love that neighbor in the summertime, when I can sleep in every day, but my neighbor wants to run his compressor to power-wash his boat every living day.  But 'tis the season to love him then, too.

We are reminded that how we treat the least among us is evidence of how we might be treating the Savior, for we never know when we may be entertaining angels among us---in every season.  We give food to charities in the fall, but how often do we remember that those with less need help at other times?  When one brother rises out of need, another is there to take his place.  Should we ignore the second because we gave in October?   'Tis the season to serve others, even when it isn't on the agenda for the rest of the world.

We know that we are told that when we are without sin ourselves, we can cast the stone at another, and we keep that on a pretty even keel in December---but it's true in every season.  When tempers run high, we slip so easily, right over that boundary into casting our words at others, mostly behind their backs.  No matter what she wore or what he said or where they went, it's still incumbent upon us: 'tis always the season to remember our own sins more than anyone else's.

We are told to turn the other cheek, to forgive 70 x 7---in every season.  Oh, yes, Christmas is a wonderful time to forgive and forget, to make amends, to start over fresh.  So is Easter.  So is every single day of the year, when we come to the inevitable realization that our hate and anger only hurt us, or hurt us more than anyone else.  'Tis the season to set ourselves free of that prison and heal our own hearts and those of anyone else we insist on punishing.  'Tis that season at any moment.

While we're at it, let's just make a few other things "in season" all year round.  Let's forget the splinter in our brother's eye and concentrate on the plank we need to remove from our own eyes.  Let's follow Christ's lead and find the good in everyone, be they people of high birth, low morals, questionable veracity, or sketchy backgrounds.  Let's be good stewards of what we have and remember that things do not measure our worth.  For Jesus, it was always the season for these ideas.  If we truly want to "keep Christ," it can't be "in Christmas" only.  Every day 'tis the season.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays, brothers and sisters of all kinds. 

Disclaimer:  I will be the first to admit that I am as bad as anyone (and worse than many) about remembering to live this way;  I wrote it as a reminder to myself, not as a sermon for the world.  Hence, the "we" first-person plural point of view.  

Until It Hurts

Several mornings ago, while I was driving in to school, one of the radio stations was doing a call-in show with a lawyer.  I think they call the guy Attorney Adam.  Some guy, a younger one, I presume, called in about a money situation.  His home had been broken into, and several electronic things were stolen:  his television, game system, and things like that.  He had gone to an unnamed big box store to get a new TV, but then he found one he liked better and decided to return the first one.  When he got home from that transaction, he took the crisp, new $100 bills out of his pocket....and found that he had been given $200 too much.  His question amounted to, "Aren't I justified in keeping this money?"  The corporation wouldn't be hurt by it, and he had just been robbed, so wasn't God, karma, or whatever just looking out for him? 

I was.....well, I was outraged.  Literally, I was driving along, alone, exclaiming to myself, "NO!  It's not your money, and it certainly isn't a gift!"  If anything, it seemed to me that it was a test, even if only for himself: would he do the right thing and return it, even if it was difficult to do?  Someone's job could even be resting on a mistake like that.  It's been a long, long time ago, but I can still remember that when I worked at McDonald's in college, our registers had to even out at the end of the shift or we'd get written up.  Surely the stakes must be a bit higher for hundreds of dollars, even in this exorbitant day and age. 

I was relieved that the attorney advised him to return the money.  One of the deejays even noted that if he did, he would feel better about it than if he kept the money.  I'm not sure they convinced the guy, though.

Maybe the season is what made this avaricious caller stand out in my mind so much.  I don't have to tell most of you this, because almost everyone who reads this is a teacher or has one in the near family, or has been one of my students.  But anyone in education can vouch that the Christmas season is one of the most rewarding and heartbreaking times of the year to spend with kids of any age.  High schoolers show their very best side during this time; even those with little extra for themselves want to help those who are younger.   My PACE Club kids have coordinated stockings for Head Start for the last two years, with most of the high school clubs contributing gifts to fill the stockings, and last year we went to the Laura Dester shelter in Tulsa to decorate the family visiting rooms for the holiday.  (They loved that so very much and wanted to repeat it, but it's a difficult thing to find time for at the end of the semester, especially when we lose a week to snow.)  LGHS Student Council has done Angel Tree giving for kids at the elementary level for at least ten years now---around 30 kids every year.   Teachers and students both contribute to that. 

If I weren't afraid of breaking some confidences or bringing attention to people who don't want it, I could tell you a number of stories about administrators, teachers, and/or staff who took it upon themselves to quietly provide for kids or whole families at Christmastime.  It's the spirit of what brings people to the field of education that leaves their hearts open at this time of year: the certain knowledge that the only thing keeping the world afloat sometimes is how much we are willing to sacrifice of ourselves for others.  It's no coincidence that "humanity" refers to both the people and how the people treat each other. 

Of course, that sacrifice means that, sometimes, everyone extends themselves too far.  What is too much; what is just enough; how do we know when to quit?   Everyone I know seems to live by an unspoken principle:  You give till it hurts.  You do not what you have to do, but what you can't live without NOT doing.  A few years ago, right before our Christmas break, one of our staff members had her home broken into, and all her Christmas presents for her children and grandchildren were stolen, as well as her own items, such as her TV.  There was no way she could afford to replace them.  But she did...because between the students and her co-workers, all the money she needed was donated within a few hours to restore her family's Christmas.  Not one of us could live with the idea of that sweet lady, one of the kindest I've ever worked with, not having what she needed for that precious time with family. 

Here's my final point on the matter, the one I so wish I could make to that standards-challenged radio caller.  I felt a bit overwhelmed with my obligations this year.  I didn't do Secret Santa with my co-workers at school because I was a little worried about paying the piper when that credit card statement rolls through in January.  We don't do a lot of gifts in my family anymore, only for the parents and the kids, but I pushed it a bit in other areas.  I was in no danger of being in financial trouble, just a little stretched.  Then Wednesday morning, we were called in for a faculty meeting.  One of our school board members came and spoke to how much they appreciated our hard work this year, and that they understood the sacrifices we've all made during the financial cuts the state has made over the last several years---no supply money and such.  But they had managed to work out a bonus for everyone:  not a lot, just $200, but it was something.   To me, it was enough. 

I don't think anyone there was in danger of breaking down in tears over $200----but how I wished I could tell that young man:  This is how God looks out for you, sir.  Give until it hurts, and it will be given back to you in greater measure than you would ever expect. 

I'd Rather Be....

I love my job; I truly do.  Few people are as lucky as I feel I have been, to know what I was put on this earth to do, and to be able to do it.  But there is one aspect of teaching that I have never and will never love, or even like:  grading.  And grading research is the absolute worst, the umpteenth circle of hell, exponentially worse than Dante ever dreamed.  I've been fully immersed in grading researched essays for about ten days now, and there are about 24 jillion things I'd rather be doing. 

I'd rather Christmas shop all day on the 71st and Hell corridor, Memorial to Garnett, than to ever try to get 100 students to complete a research paper outline.

I'd rather have fire ants invade my armpits than to drag said students to the library to (horrors!) read and take notes from reference books.

I'd rather listen to 18 solid hours of screamo "music" instead of having to listen to the chorus of "There's no information on my topic" from 75-85% of my kids.

I'd rather sleep on a bed of nails than to be forced to repeat instructions for a hanging indent on citations for each student, individually, at least 5 times.

Instead of insisting on 12-point Times New Roman font, I'd rather go back to reading papers done on notebook paper, in serial-killer handwriting.

I'd rather have to come up with 608 ways to prepare white rice than to have to read one more page of bland, boring prose on the Constitution or natural rights.

Rather than checking citations on a Works Cited page, I could happily experience another bout of pneumonia.

Finally, I'd rather have my eyes gouged out with a melon baller than to grammatically correct 1500 words of uninspired gibberish from a hormonally-crazed teenager who is convinced that spell-check is all the proofreading he'll ever need.


But oh, when that one crisply-worded, fresh, intriguing research paper comes to the top of the stack, it makes it all worth it......almost.  We'll see if I still feel the same when I finish the stack tomorrow.


(Disclaimer:  I can't take credit for that melon-baller thing; I saw it on my DVR episode of American Horror Story today, my one little respite from the daily cycle of read/sigh/laugh/weep/repeat.)

Ode to a Poem

Oh you wayward beast
Lurking in crevices of insight;
You fling out disjointed phrases
Like scraps of metal from a mental grinder.

You slither around corners,
Silent and hurried,
Leaving me only your shadow,
No substance to grasp...

You peek around the gate,
Under furniture,
Through windows,
Amused at my frustration.

Until, tired of games,
You run away,
Or come to be put to bed
Between paper and pen.

cjw

A Love Song for LG

I started this blog some months ago, because I was expecting it to be the first that would take me more than a couple of hours to write.  Writing a love story just takes more out of you---and I know, because it’s my love story.  It’s the story of a love of place, for the way the air smells and the light reflects off the buildings.  It’s a story about the love of not just one person, but a culture, of people whose spirits you recognize without even much of a need for discussion.  It’s a story that gets played out in little towns everywhere, maybe with no one to ever write it, but many lucky enough to live it.  This story, though, is mine.

Locust Grove was always on the map of my world.  When my brother and I would stay with our grandparents in Pryor for most of June every summer, we would pass through LG on our way to visit extended family in Arkansas.  We would stop at the springs to fill up the green plastic gallon thermos and Grandad’s aluminum thermos he took out on his carpentry work.  Both sides of our family, multiple generations of them, spent time on Spring and Saline Creeks for as long as I could remember.  And almost every Christmas, we’d visit Dad’s sister Jayne’s wonderfully rowdy family at their cabin on the creek, back behind Cavalier’s place.  I even got my first speeding ticket (ONLY speeding ticket for almost 25 years) in 1985, at the corner of Koelsch and Wyandotte---yep, that’s the corner of the high school!---on my way to see my mom and grandma in Pryor for Mother’s Day.  But there was no inkling that it would ever be more than a pass-through place in my life.  I was 35 when I slipped quietly into LGHS as Frances Cowan’s replacement in August of 1998, trying to get back a semblance of a personal life after a few years’ sojourn teaching in Roland. 

 What matters first is WHO mattered first:  Ma Bell.  There was no mistaking that she was a demi-goddess of the south hallway.  She was little and loud and loving to every kid that passed her door.  The first impression I had of her was that fierce side we all love; Josh Wall had a bad migraine and was talking to me in the hallway, describing the obstructions in his vision, when she saw us out there.  The next thing I knew, she was between me and Josh, working the reflexology points in his hands to relieve his headache…as she later taught me to do for Laura when she was weak and ill from chemo.   Now, 16 years later, that caretaking is the truest thing I know about her---she is the lion-hearted mother of us all.  She was the first person from school who showed up at my house after Laura died; she taught me that day that paper goods are often better to bring the family besides food.   She always has such vocal support of all the kids’ activities, and I know that I am not the only person, not by a long shot, who feels the loss of her daily since she retired.

 Betty Perkins was the department chair I first worked under.  I’d known her name as long as I could remember; my grandma used to save the Pryor newspapers for me to read when I would visit, and I would always happily devour any articles Betty had written.  Working with her was like showing up for music class and finding Madonna was your teacher. 

 And Paula Reed, my teacher- neighbor:  impossible not to love, bubbly and happy and friendly as she is.  Those who have been teachers know the bond that is formed, if you’re compatible, with the person in the classroom next to you, from the thousands of passing-periods spent at the door, joking and policing and commiserating.  I learned she is a wicked mimic, and I covet her razor-sharp wit.   We were neighbors for three years, but that was enough; we are fast friends still, though we haven’t seen each other in months.

There was a great round-table of ladies then who had lunch together most days:  Betty, Mary, and Paula, as well as librarian Joan Bennett (who has more history of LG in her head than any library could hold), Shirley Cowan, Kita Asbill, Brenda McClain, Beth Bowin and a few stragglers from time to time.  They made me welcome as one of them, though I was clearly an outsider, with no direct links to the community.  I tried the first few years to keep my ears open and my mouth shut, even though that policy can sometimes earn one the reputation of being stuck-up.  But it worked out, and all of those who remain are dear friends to me now.

A couple of years after I came in, Robin Pendergraft joined the faculty, and I met one of the most genuinely nice people I’ll ever know.  She would remember whatever was happening in my life and ask me how this or that was going---it was amazing to me that anyone could or would go to that trouble for me.   When we moved to the new wing in 2001, we were placed next door to each other.  Our friendship was sealed by that---now, since she left the LG system, we try to see each other once a month, and when we do, it’s “chatter-chatter-chatter” the entire time.  I don’t think I’ve ever had a friend who makes me feel as comfortable talking as she does---usually I’m the listener.  When she left teaching at the end of the 2011-2012 school year, she wrote me the most precious note, one that I will treasure forever.  Not many people can move me that much, and I am so grateful for her. 

Maybe the widest range of people I’ve known comes from Locust’s teaching community, past and present.  The world tends to lump us in one heap and from one mold.  Anyone in the field can tell you that educators run the gamut, from the nutty professor type to the consummate lady teacher and the young, hip, funny professional.  I won’t say who is what type, but just in my acquaintances, they are all there:  Dianna Stokes, Shannara Mayo, Karen Vich, Amanda Bennett, Kelly Moss, Jennifer Villalobos, Shirley Cowan, Sarah Keener.  (Anyone who knows this list can tell you which ones are the ladies, and which ones are the nuts---but I can’t say here!)   Most of those come from my own building; factor in people like Sandra Downing, Roy Flanary, Sandy Pierce, Blake Stephens, and Clint Hall, and the “you can’t fit me in a mold” factor it too high to calculate. 

 The people most lacking in education are the positive male role models so many of our kids desperately need, and we have some of the best.  Working on the Professional Development committee introduced me to Shane Holman, the funniest, kindest, and most game elementary principal ever.  Wendell Wolf has the biggest, softest heart I’ve ever found in a farm-raised person; he’s the best example of a good family man I could ever choose for our students.  By the way the kids talk, I know Ted Mayes is a tough but fair math teacher who has shown his students that, yes, math is useful and fun.  Tim White, who teaches most of the same juniors I do, is so brilliant at motivating students to learn history that I’ve been forced to let go of my prejudice against educators who come from a purely content-based degree program; I always believed that education coursework was essential to become a competent classroom teacher.  In addition to breaking down my judgment of alternative certification for some teachers, he keeps me on my toes as a favorite political sparring partner. 

Probably the person I’ve met in recent years who has influenced me most is Lori Helton.  When she came to our building as an English teacher four years, I was first impressed with her knowledge, then intimidated by her absolutely unflagging energy, and a little threatened by her ability to do 1,000 things at once.  I didn’t feel really comfortable as her department head because it seemed so very obvious that she would someday be an administrator, so how should I have the nerve to advise her?  When she became our assistant principal two years ago, I found a totally unexpected role model in her---unexpected, because we are so different, on the surface at least.  She’s brilliant, tough, decisive, and funny as hell, as well as talented and beautiful:  the combination all women (to my mind) long for.  Most importantly, she has worked harder than anyone I’ve ever seen in any administrative post to do the best for her students and teachers.  I’ve felt almost drowned when I consider the tsunami of change coming to education in the next few years, but she can quell my nerves with her calm assurance that everything we’ll be doing, I’ve already been doing for years, that it’s just a matter of applying different terms to what I know.  Now, with Lori serving as our newest principal, I pray that she’ll be there for my last few years as a guiding beacon through the narrow straits of testing and evaluating reforms. 

 

I worked for a number of other principals in quick succession---good ones in some way, except one of them, who should probably remain nameless (Gary Lundy).  But Steve Tyner, Max Tanner, Howard Hill, David Wilkins, and Joel Green all helped me become a better professional.  Max also conned me into what became both my life preserver and my albatross:  advising Student Council.  I had a life-size stand-up of Elvis in my room back then, and Max came to my room after school one day to ask me to become the advisor.  When I kind of hemmed and hawed about it, he started singing like the King, using the broom he was carrying as his mike, making up his own lyrics begging me to do the job.  I couldn’t help it----I laughed and gave in.  And it was a great thing for me.  I deepened my connections with the kids, the school, and the community.  Maybe that’s when I became more aware of the families and business owners, and some of the real characters we have:  Rob Foreman, Reba Pierce, Les Kern, Stephanie Anderson, Verla Fletcher, Elaine and Shannon Cook.  Gary Shamel I knew; he had been friends with my brother and my cousin Mike for years.  I didn’t get to know most of the community members very well, but had a passing acquaintance with many, and I found all of them so much more welcoming than people in a small town sometimes are. 

What of the students during these years?  Oh, there have been those that stand out in the worst ways----but not many.  Blessedly, Locust has relatively few problem children compared to other schools; it retains enough of the small-town aspect of knowing everyone’s business, so everyone better stay on their collective toes, yet it’s large enough to provide variety in the kinds of students I’ve taught over the years.  There was Dusty Bailey, the first person I ever saw wearing the “I have the body of a god.  Unfortunately, it’s Budda” T-shirt, and his cousin Boo; the two of them got me an autographed George Clooney picture for a graduation present---their graduation.  There was Casey Gwartney, my student council president who was always brimming with great ideas.  Another fantastic Stuco president, Martha (Forest) Morehead, now teaches next door to me.  I’ve had the sweetest and most helpful teacher’s aides imaginable:  Carissa Sanders, Megan Ward, Whitney Taylor, Alayna Starling, and Diana Neel, just to name a few.   I couldn’t even begin to list the students who have meant so much to me that I always refer to them as “my” kids….but I hope I don’t have to.  I hope they already realize that.   The years begin to blur, and when I run into former students, I sometimes forget not only when they came through but also their names----but not their faces, or how much I loved being their teacher.  I have been there long enough now that I’ve taught multiple generations of some families; if I include my years at Northeastern, I’ve taught three generations in a few families.  That is really, really hard for me to comprehend, but I take warm, heartfelt pride in having had the chance to be a little part of their lives. 

 As my career winds down, I find even more people in the town that I’m connected to.  Cydni Tillery and Marea Breedlove at the Food Bank have taught me much about the needs of our students in the community.  It’s rare for me to go anywhere outside of Locust and run into someone from there that I DON’T have some connection to.  I’ve taught their grandson, worked with their sister, clashed with their niece over a grade, served on a committee with their brother.  Maybe they’ve even been hunting at my brother’s place in South Dakota with some of his friends from LG.   And no matter where I go---my podiatrist’s office in Broken Arrow, a tire shop by Eastland Mall, my Aunt Carolyn’s house, water aerobics at the Pryor Rec Center---people always ask me about Ma Bell as soon as something tips them off that I teach at Locust Grove. 

I left my home, left my little town, to become a part of another, hoping that I’d have nothing to live up to or live down because I was my own person, cut whole from my own cloth and shaped by my own character.     Now I see that nothing is my “own”; it’s the life of that other little town that framed my character and gave it meaning for the last 15 years.   Other than my family (and George Clooney, of course), LG is the longest-running love story of my life.  No paltry little blog could give it the beauty it deserves.  All I can offer in repayment is one golden phrase:  Thank you.  Thank you for this greatest of loves---to serve another. 

 

 

 

 

Breaking Free

One day this week, a radio announcer mentioned that it was the annual Great American Smoke-Out, a day encouraging smokers to quit.  It reminded me that I had passed eleven smoke-free years this summer, about half the length of time I smoked.  It got me thinking about what kinds of things chain us---because we all know there are almost countless ways to be enslaved.

When I was still a smoker, the Smoke-Out was a yearly annoyance that I ignored.  Now it just seems futile when I remember how it made me feel.  Still, I know it must work for some people, and I hope it helps move them along the road.  For me, that didn't happen until Laura was told she had to quit in order to get massive hormone treatments to avoid a hysterectomy, and I said we would both quit since it wasn't fair for her to live in a house with a smoker and try to quit. Otherwise, I don't know if I would have ever quit.  Another friend once said that it depressed her just to think of giving up her "friend"---her cigarettes---that she kissed so often every day.  The analogy rang true with me instantly.  I even asked my doctor once why she didn't harp on me about it, and she replied, "Because I know that with you, it wouldn't do any good, but one day, you'll pick up a cigarette and say 'I'm tired of having these things run my life,' and you'll put them down and walk away."  Her prediction wasn't far off the mark:  the first time I tried to quit, I did it.  It was the only time I tried;  I gave up two packs a day and didn't look back.  Of course, the whole first year is a blur since Laura was diagnosed with cancer three days after we quit, so my mind and my time were fully occupied.  But I've not seriously considered having a smoke since.  I know I'll never go back, never have to battle that particular demon again.

Except.....except, there are so very many things to be addicted to.  I already wrote about my hard-core crush on sugar that led me to have bariatric surgery last spring.  That has helped me lose weight, but it's not a cure-all.  I struggle EVERY day to get all the protein I need and avoid things that have no nutritional value.  One of the shocking things that came out of my surgery is that I can eat real food and feel full very fast; carbs, on the other hand, don't fill me up at all, so I really can't keep them around---I'll eat them without even realizing I'm doing it.  I didn't lose a taste for sugar and have never experienced the "dumping" syndrome some have from consuming too many carbs after surgery:  a kind of sickness that sounds very much like having an episode of plummeting blood sugar, with sweats, wracking nausea, and nerve tremors from head to toe.  It's an awful feeling, but I almost wish I'd have it so that I could get my body to not crave sweets.  Instead, I try to focus on just drinking protein and eating yogurt as often as I can when I feel that urge to gobble down some chocolate.

I never had a problem with alcohol, and I haven't had a drink in years because of meds that I take.  There is, though, one other addiction that still jangles my nerves from time to time:  the memory of one person I haven't seen in 23 years.  I don't dwell on him, yet occasionally I have a nightmarish dream where he surfaces in some way I find happy and subsequently leaves a fading contrail across my consciousness for several days.  I can't for the life of me figure why, for I know enough to know that if I ever saw him again, I would dislike him for an almost infinite list of reasons.  For instance, when I knew him, he more than once told me that women were responsible for wrecking the American economy and idealism, because we refused to go back to home-making after World War II was over and soldiers returned home.  "We" took jobs that men needed; "we" complained that men were shiftless and undependable; "we" were meant to be caretakers more than rule makers.  He even told me that I (all women, really) should have remained at home under the "care" of my father until I married, instead of being out in the world on my own working as a professional.  Knowing myself now, I can't believe I didn't see the many red flags that throws up.  I was just that blind to his flaws, I guess.  Thank merciful God I was NOT so blind as to do what he asked, which was to walk away from everything and everyone I knew to go with him.  Still, here I sit speaking of him all these years later, racing through writing this so that my addicted spirit won't dredge him up to drag him through my dreamscape tonight.  If he is the one addiction I never shake, I'll consider it a win that at least, at last, I knew even the sound of his name was bad for me. 

There are so many things that chain our souls and our selves:  debt, drama, drugs; bad marriages and lonely weekends and warm, soothing drinks to numb the pain of both;  romance, caffeine, a new dress; pills or purchases to keep us wrapped up in cottony softness.  I know the pleasure of breaking some of my chains.  The others I'll keep rattling as a warning: some day, I'll be coming for them, too.

Hey, Guys!

 I was never what you might call a girly girl.  It seemed silly to me to be a big German-build farm girl and then to try going around acting prissy.  It wasn't that I didn't want to be into pretty things, makeup and ruffles and all that;  I really craved it.  But I felt like a fool and a faker, certain that people would laugh at me behind my back if I tried to act girly.  As a result, I developed a kind of tough, remote exterior that was off-putting to some, especially other girls.  Shopping, makeup, hair:  all that stuff was just beyond me.  I have only had a few really close girlfriends; on the other hand, I've had a lot of boy friends, which is not the same as boyfriends, of course.

Maybe part of the issue was that I had a little brother who I treasured and spent a lot of time with.  He was more into outside stuff, but we often played games together and had almost no conflicts.  While I had some good girl friends at school, I spent a large portion of my elementary years riding all over the pastures at home on our motorcycles with Bo and our friend Danny, who was like another brother in our family.  We tore around jumping pond dams and daring each other to act out stupid stunts.  In the winter, Dad or Danny's step-dad Kenneth would pull us over snow and ice on an ancient pickup hood, or we'd play pool in the basement rec room.  Danny taught me how to bridge a deck of cards when I shuffled.  After I changed schools for fourth grade, we were neck-and-neck academic competition for each other, in the same class for the rest of our school years.  Our parents hung out together, so we were the best of friends until Danny discovered alcohol much earlier than I did.  Although we hadn't seen each other in probably ten years when he died, his suicide when we were just 30 was heart-rending.

I didn't start dating until I was in college, and that was also when I discovered having close male friends as an adult was practical and fun.  I learned a LOT more about the world from guys I worked with both at Rogers and NSU; plus, there was the added bonus of always having someone to dance with!  My academic team at Rogers included Steven, a computer geek, and Don, a pre-med major.  Steven gave me a very basic intro to technology; Don, the entree into a class called Word Origins that taught me worlds about the English language.  And this isn't even counting the wide range of people I worked with at the on-campus radio station.

At NSU, I found Wally and Dean, who I spent ridiculous amounts of time with at the river, at the lake, at Granny's Attic (anyone familiar with Tahlequah in the '80's knows that establishment), and at concerts and clubs in Tulsa.  We had more fun than any three people should have in a lifetime.  John and Anthony were like an older and younger brother; Tom was an unofficial mascot for all kinds of groups; a dozen other guys came and went in that twilight culture that college was as I worked straight through to my Master's degree.

Unfortunately, what I didn't realize at the time was that this was not a permanent state of affairs.  I dated none of these friends, though I loved them all dearly in some way or another.  And once college was over, we all tended to drift.  Girlfriends and wives don't usually take well to their men having female friends, no matter whether we were friends first.   One friend was deeply hurt that none of us in a large circle of long-term friends came to his wedding; when it was finally brought up, we had to tell the truth:  his wife didn't send invitations to any of us.

As an adult, I've only found it harder to make new male friends.   The married ones don't have time or a need for it; the single ones think I'm hitting on them, an idea that I find appalling and humiliating.  And that's really a surprise to me.  I don't prance around and act flirty (see paragraph 1); I wouldn't even know how to do that.  I don't need a man to run my life, but it would sure be fun to find one to run with again.

The Writing on the Wall

I was deleting some of my old files off the school server the other day when I came across a document named "Bathroom Rant."  I had forgotten it until I opened it and started
reading.  The document was dated five years ago, and I remember making a two-page poster of it and posting it in the bathroom in our new wing after the first time someone defaced it.   Before deleting it, I printed it out so that I could record it here.  It seemed like a good topic for a short blog. 

Ladies:

For 7 years we have enjoyed this bathroom in practically the same condition as when it was new.

The stall doors work, the sinks have good water pressure, the soap and towel dispensers produce their products efficiently, and we have nice mirrors to primp in.

Please, do not feel you need to add to this.  Your written comments as to who is "hott" (or "nott")  are of no interest to the rest of us.  We would like to continue to enjoy a clean, neat environment where we can contemplate our own thoughts, not yours.

You may certainly express them elsewhere, though.  Might I suggest, an essay?  Then you may truly rhapsodize over your love in a pure and beautiful way, free forever from associations with toilets and all that they imply.

Thank you for reading.

Ms. Welker

(P.S.  This is the ONLY think I have ever "written" on a bathroom wall, which I will continue to be proud of.)

It's only now, long after the fact, that I realize the futility of my rant:  anyone silly enough to write "So-and-so is hott" on a bathroom wall wouldn't read past the first line.  But I felt better after putting it up, I know.  

It'll always be a mystery to me, why young people feel compelled to deface property in any way----but especially writing their love's name in a toilet stall.  Shakespeare could've made something funny out of the topic.  It just makes me aggravated that we haven't come any further than that as a society. 

Stand Tall

I was reading an autobiographical story in my favorite literary magazine, The Sun, this morning.  The author wrote about her lifelong addiction to frequenting thrift shops for clothing, furniture, and toys, especially when she was a divorced mother of two boys with little to live on. The clothing she favored for herself was gauzy tops and jeans; more than once she was told that the image she was projecting would not help her advance professionally in office politics.  But that was how she saw herself until that image was transformed by a Chanel suit, size two, selling for $25.  She said that she was "five feet tall and bone thin" when she found it, and when she put it on, she no longer felt wispy and ineffectual.  It changed her entire demeanor.

I don't know why that struck me in a way that made me feel fortunate, but it did. 

I have always hated being tall, as long as I can remember.  My mother, who is very petite, was my ideal; I wanted to be little and cute, not tall and tragically clumsy.  I was always one of the tallest members of my class, or any group of kids; it was difficult finding clothing long enough.  Mom and Grandma, and then I myself, made a fair number of my clothes, which helped with having pants and dresses the right length.  Early in my high school years, I remember Mom sewing wide bands of braid to the bottom of my jeans to make them long enough (thank God for odd 70's fashion trends).  I think it was my junior year of high school that I wore moccasins to school every single day after the first day of school, because then my jeans didn't need to be so long.  That didn't help the fact that I couldn't find the fashion Jordache and Gitano jeans that were so popular by then in the right length.  By the time I went to college, the blessed unisex trend of shrink-to-fit 501 Levis saved me, followed by sweatpants worn pulled up our calves and then capris and Keds sneakers.  By the 90's, stirrup pants made a reappearance from my childhood, and I transitioned from those to wearing the flattest shoes I could find until I had to start wearing orthopedic shoes.  That was about the time that I began special-ordering tall pants so I could have them long enough.  No way could a teacher go to work in high water pants, not with teenagers.  Much too brutal. 

I heard about my great "fortune" from short people all the time, especially my mom and grandma and great-grandma, all of whom needed stepstools to reach into cabinets. the tops of closets, even the lower branches of fruit trees.  Mom complains still about how pants and shirts are much too long for her, but I remind her she can always cut them off; I can't add a ruffle to the bottom of my pants or anything.  She doesn't buy it, and I don't blame her---lots of current styles overwhelm her little frame.  I guess I never saw their short stature as a problem because they all have been powerful, indomitable women who did whatever they needed to do when it needed to be done. 

But not until today when I read about that struggling mother gaining tangible power from her bargain-basement suit did the power I gained from my height coalesce in my mind.  I never have felt physically threatened anywhere that I can remember, not by men or women, despite the fact that I am fairly shy and still a little timid, though less so than when I was younger.  I have no problem drawing myself up into my full height if faced with a potentially dangerous situation.  Although I used to wear heels when I taught college, I've never once felt the need to do so like some of my shorter-statured peers have in order to appear more in control to students.  My long legs probably were the better part of my ability to do the splits and kick the top of the door frame the way I used to do to wheedle some good behavior out of my kids.  And now that I've started the dreaded height-shrinking that so many women face, I guess I'm a lot more grateful for the extra room I have to shrink from. 

The past 50 years of standing tall have surely been worth the fashion angst.  I'd still take the joy of being able to fit into a size two Chanel suit, though, no matter what the price. 

I Am Your Teacher

Sometime recently as my kids were working on essays and expressing their frustration with the process, I told them I understood perfectly, because I do this writing every week, and sometimes it just doesn't flow like I want it to.  In fact, I set it up tied to a day of the week so that I would be forcing a deadline on myself; I don't like to fail, and failing publicly is the worst, so putting it out there keeps me to a regular writing schedule, even though it's difficult at times.  Some of them wanted to know what the site was, so I posted it (with no assignments to read it, nor worries about what I'd written) on the board for anyone who was interested in reading it.  I don't know who, if anyone, has read it.  But it made me consider, not for the first time,  how kids perceive their teachers. 

This is for you, student.

I am your teacher.  Mostly, you see me in the same 25' x 22' room, 50 minutes a day, for an academic year.  There's no way for you to imagine my world as I see it, 50 years encompassing the entire central Plains of the country, the places I am familiar with.   I gather that what you see is a middle-aged overweight woman wearing orthopedic shoes, capris, and casual shirts.  You can't see that in my soul I still feel about 22---as do most adults.  I tell you why I wear the orthopedic sneakers.  Less often do I tell you that it's hard for me to find pants long enough, because most clothing manufacturers seem to think that all fat women have legs thislong.  And as far as dressing casually, I just hate to iron.  Life's too short for that.  That's really how I feel about most housekeeping and one of the reasons I'd make a lousy housewife.

You learned pretty quickly that there are some things that make me mad, some that make me laugh, and some that I don't really react to.   You don't know that I have this gene I inherited that is positively allergic to trashy, disrespectful behavior like drawing on furniture or leaving empty cans and bottles in the floor of my classroom.  It's my dad's fault---and I'm proud of it.  We were expected to keep our home looking nice (at least for the world outside) and neat, and it carries over to my classroom.  That's why trash and drawings make me furious.  I can laugh with you because I've been DOING it for most of my life; I have (as I've told you) the sense of humor of a 17-year-old boy, and I have to restrain myself from laughing----a lot.  And as far as not reacting,....sometimes it's just better for everyone if I don't.  The harder you try to shock me, the less I'll react to it.  It's the only way to control some people. 

Although I tell you at the beginning of the year that I am not married and don't have kids, you sometimes ask if that's my daughter with me in a picture on a filing cabinet.  It's my sister, at her wedding; she was 33 and I was 46.  It's a shock to me every time I realize you don't know anything AT ALL about my family.  I'm the oldest child; I have a brother and a sister, and my parents are blessedly still alive.  I still kiss and hug my mama and daddy every time I see them.   I've heard rumors that I supposedly hate all Ag kids, which is the craziest thing I've ever heard:  every. single. member. of my family is in agribusiness except for me.  But we were taught not to expect (or ask) for special consideration for activities we did---we did them on our own time.   We worked hard, knew our boundaries, behaved or suffered the consequences, had everything we needed, but were not spoiled except in one way:  we got to travel.  Plus, there was NO skipping school; we had to be bleeding from the eyeball or in full cardiac arrest to miss school, so I don't understand at all why you skip.  I thank my mom and dad for all those things every time I think of it. 

You are stunned when I tell you I live in Broken Arrow, as though it were the end of the earth, not the 40 minutes it takes me to drive in each day.  There's no way for you to know that I do that because I love the road, and I love you, and I love to be close to my family.  Living here helps me with all three.  I can still love my job if I'm not living where people are up in my business all the time; my family lives west of Tulsa, so I'm partway between my job and them, living here.  I have a church and friends here that keep me busy.  I'm close to entertainment, but I really kind of live in the country.  It's the perfect setup for me, for now.

Like all your teachers, I have a life you don't often consider, not because you're mean, just because you are young.  We have big hearts, small wallets, broken hearts, happy dreams, loss, hope, pain, and love.  We cry---I cried last night, missing my best friend who died in 2003.  We laugh at the same TV shows, get scared at the same thoughts, and dance to (some!) of the same music you do.  We make huge mistakes:  I badly offended someone I work with this week, and I've grieved over it for several days now, because I respect and trust him.  We know your tricks and distractions (don't ever think we don't know when you're trying to get us off track so you won't have to work; it's just that sometimes we know there are good things that can come of the off-track discussion).  We do what we do because we love knowing that something we teach you will come back to your mind in later years when you need it, though you probably don't believe that now.   That's OK.  We know.  We love you.

I love you.

Look Closely

Who among us is immune to anger?  It's so easy to get a good, fiery dose of it, almost any time we please.  An hour in city construction traffic, a conversation that goes astray and becomes an argument, an unfinished task assigned to a child or a co-worker----almost anything can set some people off.  I am myself a little slow to anger, but then I hit a limit, and FLASH! it's suddenly a bonfire almost out of control.  Some days get like that when I'm hit with several things successively.  Usually, though, it's just garden-variety frustration from being asked to repeat the same directions 1,000 times (or at least to every student individually) or from not planning ahead carefully and therefore creating a crisis for myself.   As long as I don't hold a grudge (and that is a topic for another week; I have a little problem with that), I almost always forget the episode within a few hours, a day at the most.

The last couple of weeks have been frustrating for me, mostly due to major dental work that has been more painful than anything else I've ever had---and I have had tens of thousands of dollars of dental work.  I'm at 12 days out from the procedure and still popping pain pills like Skittles.  Plus, I took on of my cats to a new veterinarian this week and picked her up two days later, with a bill of over $400.  But yesterday looked to be a good day.  I didn't have school, I had the last of my physical therapy sessions for my shoulder, and I would be seeing a relative that I used to be close to but hadn't seen in over nine years. 

Maybe I was careless because I was thinking about all that, or maybe I finally just fell victim to the blind spot in my CRV.  Either way, I pulled into a parking space at the physical therapy clinic and realized that the car next to me had parked in two spaces, putting me in two spaces as well.  There was a whole space next to me, so I backed up to move over into that spot....until I heard a terrible scrape/crunch.  To my horror, I had backed into a big, shiny pickup, the kind that usually comes with a big, shiny ego.  I pulled up into the space and dashed inside to ask the people sitting at the front if they knew who it belonged to.  They said, "Not yet," and kind of grinned.  I knew they had heard it, but I didn't have time to be mad at them for smirking.  I went up to one of the therapists and asked her if the gentleman she was working with had a big pickup.  She said yes, and she would let him know what was going on and come out with him when he was done in a few minutes.

I went outside and looked over the damage.  There were several bad scrapes to the paint on my vehicle, but no major dents.  The pickup looked a little scraped up, but I also know that all kinds of damage can be hidden (or "found") in situations like this.  I had no idea what to expect---especially when the therapist walked out with a big, burly-looking bearded fellow.  But then, to my surprise.....

He walked up laughing.  He said something to the effect of, "Shoot, hon, I can buff that right out.  Don't you worry about it at all.  I'm sure not worried about it."  I think after the first sentence my mouth was hanging open, and all I could say was, "Really?"  He said, "This is nothing, girl.  It's my wife's truck anyway.  I can fix it right up."  I asked him to wait just a second and stepped over to my car to get a piece of paper.  I wrote out my number and name and said, "Here, take this, just in case.  You might change your mind.  And thank you so much."  He laughed and said, "It's fine.  God bless you."  Still a little dazed, I went in for my appointment, shaking my head and remarking to the therapist, "What a kind, generous man."  She smiled at me wisely and said, "God is speaking to him."  She explained, without any confidences revealed, that he had been going through terrible trauma due to a fatal accident that he was involved in but not responsible for earlier in the year.  This, relatively speaking, was nothing in comparison.  But he had been speaking lately about prayer and forgiveness with her.  She said she felt that he'd demonstrated something he needed to express with his actions. 

I started my paces for my therapy, and about 15 minutes in, my cell phone rang.  It was the man's wife.  She asked if this was Cathy, and I said it was.  I still hadn't learned my lesson; I thought, "Oh, no, here it comes.  She's going to be really angry at me AND her husband for letting me off the hook."  No.  This wonderful woman told me her name, and said, "I just wanted to let you know that everything is just fine, sweetie.  I know if this had happened to me, I'd be in a panic.  But my husband has done body work for years and he won't have any problem with this.  Don't you worry one bit."  I thanked her, using her name, and told her to have a wonderful day.  "You, too, honey, you too.  And God bless you." 

I tell you, friends, I never felt so unworthy of a blessing----and so grateful.

It's so easy to get caught up in the ugly of the world, whether it's of our own doing or someone else's.  We seem to feel justified in getting up a good head of steam and spewing it around for all to witness.  How much happier it is to look for the good and to share THAT with everyone we come across!  I want to be that person, the one who finds the gem buried in a dull rock---the kindness, love, and generosity of spirit that everyone is capable of, if only we look closely.

Make Me Laugh

It's a funny thing, how we learn to find humor in the world.  My family uses jokes and sarcasm to get through life, especially some of the tougher times.  I think most of the world (or at least most Americans) are like that.  Not everyone appreciates it, and there's a time and place where humor doesn't belong....something I've had to learn the hard way a time or two.  Now I tend to fault on the other side; I can be way too serious.  I think that happened after my best friend Laura's death.  We used to laugh a lot, so it felt like laughter died for me for a good long while. 

I've gotten better with time, and this year I made a conscious choice to try to be a little more light-hearted with my students.  I'm seeing good results, even though what is funny to me isn't always funny to them.  When I ask them what makes them laugh, almost to a person they will say, "People falling down."  Then they can recount endless tales of people slipping on ice, a friend crashing on the basketball court, a video they watched of a woman free-falling into a huge floor safe opening in a convenience store.  OK, I admit, I saw that video, too, and it is kind of funny.  Annnnddd.....if I really tell the truth, I've laughed at others, but mostly myself, for the same thing.

There was the time that a couple of junior high students loosened the bolts in my not-very-sturdy desk chair, sometime back in the mid-90's.  I sat down, the legs on the left side shot out from under me, the rest of the chair slid to the right, and there I was on the floor, barely able to look over the desk and see the horrified expressions of my kids----and I burst into hysterical laughter.  Really, what else was there to do?  I had no dignity left; laughter was the only way to regain a bit of it.

There was the episode almost six years ago when I went out for an afternoon coffee on a first date with a nice guy named Jon.  Later that night, he had a heart attack---boy, did we take some kidding over that.  But it didn't end there.  A couple of days later, when I was visiting him in the hospital, I got tripped up by the lead wires on his monitor when I tried to walk away from the bedside.  Whomp!  Those things yanked my feet right out from under me, and I landed with such a resounding thump on the top of my forehead that it left a dent at my hairline.  Both of my eyes turned black, and many laughs were had at my expense, including my own amusement after I got over the accompanying embarrassment and the desire to have the floor open up and swallow me right there. 

Of course, some of the best fun of my entire life was had with Laura.  She had a completely infectious laugh; no one could hear it and not laugh along.  I remember playing some kind of trivia card game once, and she was moderating the game and reading the answers.  This was over a Christmas holiday, and we were all feeling a little giddy and silly from having time off.  She came across an answer that she misread:  "Who is St. Francis of a Sissy?"  After a split second, we all started rolling with laughter, including her.  "Oh, that's St Francis of Assisi!"  I was guilty of the same kind of mistake one time, playing Trivial Pursuit with my dear friend Diana, my freshman roommate from college.  She asked the question, "Who wore the coat of many colors?"  My country-girl background leapt in front of my good sense with the answer I shouted out:  "Dolly Parton!"  Diana---I am not making this up---laughed so hard that she turned over the chair she was sitting in, leaving us both howling on the floor.  Even then, I was saying, "What?"  She shouted, "It's JOSEPH, you backwater hillbilly!"  I'm laughing as I write this, and I laugh every time I hear Dolly Parton's name since then, and that was 25 years ago.

Laura and I never really fought, but we would harangue each other sometimes until the other said something about leaving it alone.  More than once, she would tell me to just let whatever it was go because I was "giving her a tic."  She was the sweetest, most even-tempered person ever, but we were close enough that we'd sometimes react to things the way I've seen some married couples act:  to look at the other like he or she was crazy or somehow responsible for all the crazy in the world.  Once, we went to the Hardee's drive-through in the middle of the night for breakfast.  There was a line of drunks who had left the bar and were picking up breakfast to sober up, so we were stuck in line for a while.  We rolled down the windows to smoke and were hit with a very foul smell. She turned and looked at me with a demanding glare and asked, "What IS that smell?"   I said I didn't know.  She said, "Well, it smells like a huge wad of Parmesan cheese and dirty feet!"  Again with the looking at me.  Finally I said, "Well, it's not my feet!  They're very clean."  She started laughing then.  I started laughing.  She laughed so hard that her face turned purple---she did that sometimes when her laughter got the better of her.  Laughing myself, I shouted, "Stop that!  You're going to make yourself puke!"  (That sometimes happened too, if she laughed too hard and didn't breathe.)  The more she tried to quit, the more she laughed.  Just about the time we reached the window, she started gagging.  I coolly reached into the back floorboard, handed her the little car trashcan, and turned to give the money to the cashier in one motion.   We had many laughs for years after that, how the only puker that cashier had in line that night was in the car with the stone-cold sober girls. 

We had, in fact, more laughter in the 20 years we knew each other than a lot of people get in a whole lifetime.  It's no wonder that some part of my sense of humor died with her when I think of all the ways she made me smile, giggle, guffaw, and roll with side-splitting fun.  Some was crude, much was witty, and it was all based on complete trust and enduring friendship.  My friend Mary Beth is one who can make me laugh now with her dry, sarcastic observations about society, politics, life, and even cancer.  You know you've got a remarkable person on your hands when you learn that she had parties with her family before her mastectomies, celebrating "Breast Friends" and "Thanks for the Mammaries."

My nieces and nephews have been wonderful sources of hilarity, ever since birth.  The whole family loves kids and will flock to them and tell stories about funny things they do.  My brother's dry humor just kills me.  I remember talking to him once in the fall and asking him if he'd had any snow yet.  "'Bout a foot," he replied.   I said, "Really?" and he responded, "Yep....snowflakes about a foot apart."  OK, that's not the greatest example, but it's one I remember.  My mom and I can sometimes get to laughing at the silliness of life and get the giggles together, and dad is happiest when he's making someone laugh.  In fact, you just can't call yourself a Welker if you don't have a sense of humor.  If you don't believe me, check out my cousin Dennis Welker's facebook page; he's made sly wit an art form. 

Laughter is more than the best medicine; it's the glue that holds life together and the cells that bind hearts.  Hope you've got a good healthy dose of it in your world, dear reader. 

Anatomy of a Discussion

I 've just hurried home to write after a dinner/discussion group at a friend's home.  I've had several topics in mind today, but dinner changed that.  Do you ever have the chance to hear how much nine educated, well-informed women can cover in three hours' time?  Here's how it went, to the best of my recollection:

New York.  The extensive Picasso exhibit there at the MOMA in 1980.  A Matisse exhibit a couple of years later.  How wonderful it would be to live in NYC for about six months after I retire, renting a crummy studio apartment, working a little job in the evenings so I could spend the days seeing the museums, sights, every cool cranny of the city.  The feeling of safety most of us felt there, contrary to everything one hears.  A witnessed confrontation on a train.  Bernhard Goetz.  Son of Sam, when Robin lived there.  A reasonably priced European-style temporary residence for my next trip to the Big Apple.

Tomatoes and cheeses.  Homegrown tomato varieties, Big Boy and Mountain something---the Mountain variety much preferred by Brenda.  Wal-Mart vs. Sooners in Sulphur. 

A torn meniscus and a torn kneecap.  Recovery.  Limping and not limping.  Reminiscing about the group's trip to Roman Nose State Park two years ago, where one of the patients first got hurt, despite the general acknowledgement that it was a wonderful trip.  The whole rooming-house hotel we rented then, the lake, the horseback riding, the kayaking.  The wine---much wine---on the balcony of that hotel on a side street in Watonga.  General hilarity.

Dinner.  Tomato bisque soup, pork tenderloin, roasted chicken, crab casserole, quinoa salad, zucchini fritters, potato salad, Dakota bread.  Raspberry cobbler.  Mary Beth's attempt to remove the bread crumbs she mixed in with the crab that were supposed to top it off. 

Dogs.  The mental acuity of one dog who was "very cerebral."  That said dog could understand if you said, "52 minutes," and would come back in 52 minutes to remind you.  Dogs who knew when it was time to eat, and how they told you.  Cats.  My sister's cats who have had it in for me. 

Mikey Weinstein and his fight to keep church and state separate in the military.  Hate mail sent to the Tulsa Interfaith Alliance for hosting him here at our church, All Souls Unitarian.  The number of family members of the group that worked in the military.  Experiments the military performed on soldiers before the Helsinki Accord:  the same as Nazi experiments on Jewish victims, or not?  How to fight the encroaching pressure on society from a few who can't seem to understand how many ways a merger of church and state would go horribly wrong.  The fact that my students see it immediately when we study The Crucible.  Tony Kushner speaking at TU in November.

Education and poverty.  School uniforms and how well they work.  School administrators (none of mine) who were the wackiest.  Which state decided that free lunches for the whole school are cheaper than processing all the applications.  How that might work with other government programs.  Movies used in the classroom.  Condoms as a student research topic.  Lipstick parties.  Why boys want their underwear to show. 

Tea Partiers.  Government shutdown.  Furloughs and park closings.  Veterans.  Lies and disinformation spread through "sophistry of the highest order," a statement for which I wanted to hug Charlene, pat her on the back, and quote her on the world's biggest billboard.  A vote on the debt ceiling and the end of our economy.  No one had to ask who to blame. 

Many thanks, a little play time with the host's granddaughter, hugs all around.  A good and enlightened evening. 

You give nine women---teachers, business owners, artists, nurses, public servants, technology experts---three hours, and we can solve most of the problems of the world....or at least find a way to laugh them off. 

This I Know

For tonight's offering, I submit a little list of things I have learned in life, usually the hard way:

1)  Don't accidentally brush up against a wire while working on your cantankerous air conditioning unit.

2)  Along those same lines, don't touch any metal part of an umbrella handle if you find yourself out and about during a lightning storm.

3)  A constantly-running toilet can make your water bill skyrocket.

4)  Never use black enamel-based oil paint on anything you feel ambivalent about painting black.

5)  All deer are vaguely suicidal. 

6)  When doing the splits, don't let any observers rush you.  The damage could be permanent.

7)  Don't stick your whole face into a peony and sniff.  They stink terribly.

8)  Mow across the hills, not up and down.

9)  Check your wallet BEFORE you order the meal.

10)  Never try to burn a tick off your brother.

11)  Never attempt to stop a slamming wood door with a big window in it.

12)  Self-rising flour, cake flour, and all-purpose flour are not the same.

13)  Don't put a cat in a wading pool.

14)  Cheap rum is much worse than no rum at all.

15)  Don't blow a bubble with your bubble gum while riding your motorcycle through a field at sundown.  It gets crunchy.

16)  A kid that you have written off can still turn things around.

17)  There's only ever been one perfect person, and you're not it.

18)  Tease a dog, appease a cat.  Dogs forgive all, cats nothing.

19)  Don't jerk the gears on a hay truck carrying nine big round bales up a steep hill.

20)  It doesn't hurt a baby to eat things that have touched the floor.

21)  Drive like everyone else on the road failed road-rage intervention class.

22)  Use a coaster.

23)  Call home when you say you will.

24)  Give and accept gifts graciously, but simply; do not try to get a reading from the giving or receiving.

25)  If you have to think about it for more than a few moments, it is probably wrong---the wrong thing to do, the wrong thing to say, the wrong thing to buy, whatever.

26)  Don't make out with men with stubble.

27)  Screening calls can save time and temper.

28)  Dreams just clean out all the closet trash in your head and don't necessarily mean anything at all.

29)  Certain animals (pigs, chickens, cows) are for dinner, not for pets, and certainly not for decoration!

30)  Friends might love you more, but family loves you longer.

31)  Be willing to change any list of things learned along the way, for life will surely show you that everything, anything, can change at any time.

Perception is Reality

I have a good friend at work who is one of the smartest people and best teachers I've ever known.  He happens to teach a subject that runs concurrent with the content in my class:  he teaches American history, and I American literature.  We have views that often are symmetrical, but many that are in opposition to each other, and on the rare occasions that we get to talk at any length, our conversations run to those differences pretty quickly.  I can't even pretend to persuade him to agree with me, no matter how passionately I believe whatever it is we're discussing, mostly because his knowledge of politics, economics, and their effects on history completely eclipses anything I can begin to grasp.  I'm not too proud to say that whenever we have one of these conversations, I usually leave with a list of eight or ten names of theories, groups, or people that I need or want to look into.  Sometimes the new info just immediately gets my back up more; sometimes I have to consider it for a few days to let it sink in.  Often, I read and then let go, because I can't make it all meld in my mind, not with the things that I have to keep focused on at the time---lesson plans, essays, the minutia of life.  But I'm always grateful that I have learned something new from our passing debates.

There is one that has been niggling at my brain since before school started.  I don't remember the way the discussion started, but I know when it went off on a new tangent:  with my reference to the common statement that "perception is reality," applying it to some aspect of law.  I think Tim was somewhat appalled that I would assert such a thing.  Later the same day, he sent me an email with an attachment about how the Constitution is a fact, not perception, that the rights granted therein are universal and absolute and not to be based on opinion, and that because we are a republic, majority rule cannot determine rights; they ARE rights, no matter how many people agree or disagree with them.  Generally, I have to agree...except for one little issue:  mankind is annoyingly human and incapable of such purely black-and-white reasoning.  Yes, I know this makes the reasoning no less valid, but it renders the whole argument an exercise in futility for most people.

C. S. Lewis wrote, "What you see and hear depends a good deal on where you are standing; it also depends on what sort of person you are." Or as that great late-20th century bard Everlast so distinctly put it, "You know, where it is, yo, it usually depends on where you start."  Both men surely must have been considering the way that our own frame of reference affects everything---EVERYthing---that we experience, whether through thought or physical action.  

There are, of course, always cases where perception is reality; the arts are rife with examples of whatever-floats-your-boat kind of junk.  I think Salvador Dali was a nut.  Some love him, some hate him, and some don't know a thing about him and will never care, all based on our perceptions.  We could say the same thing about a billion other artistic endeavors:  velvet paintings of dogs playing poker, Megadeth, Swan Lake, heroin-chic 90's supermodels, Beanie Babies, Adele, Cadillac convertibles, and the mullet.  My world has been solidly centered on the arts since I drew breath, so I understand this way of thinking; it's where I live.  One of the most dramatic lessons I remember learning in my degree program is that you can take the same student essay, give it to four different teachers to grade, and come out with four different letter grades, all justified by the teacher to some degree.  We learn to narrow that focus as professionals, but rarely do any of us think to truly consider the repercussions of passing judgement in day-to-day life.

So it is in the political, legal, and moral landscapes:  we pass the scenery with little thought beyond "I love this, but I hate that," even though every pronouncement comes from our own frame of reference.  Gun rights is always a hot-button issue.  The author from the link Tim sent me referenced this; he asserted that the right to bear arms was fact, not opinion, which I agree with.  (I'm a Democrat, not an idiot.)  However, everyone's frame of reference is going to shape the depth of that fact.  For example, I grew up with a healthy respect for guns, mostly because I didn't see them a lot, though I knew we had them.  Do we have the right to keep and bear arms?  Absolutely.  Do we need to build our own personal arsenals for some doomsday scenario or, as is often cited, to protect ourselves from a tyrannical government?  I don't think there's enough firepower to carry off either of those things, so it seems foolish to me to allow everyone to collect as much artillery and weaponry as they can manage.  Plus, "yo, it usually depends on where you start"; I see a difference between a family who hunts (like some of mine do) and a gang or cult group stockpiling automatic weapons designed solely for killing humans.  I have friends, though, who are unfamiliar with weapons and have a terror of them, and while I don't carry my fear that far, like them, I hate the thought of open carry laws because there are so many crazy people out there who will think they are going to stop something with their sidearm and will try to be a cowboy, with tragic results.  All that to say this:  our perception of the truth of our "rights" has to be colored by our experiences, which then renders them our own reality, our opinion.   

The other side has to see this, too, in the great humbug of conservative policy:  same-sex marriage.  If discrimination is wrong, then it's wrong to hold back rights enjoyed by those who are married "traditionally" from those who are not.  Yes, conservative beliefs may color the lens through which they view the issue, but it doesn't allow them to rescind those rights from those with whom they disagree.  

If we all could agree to see things in such a way, wouldn't it make it easier to smooth everyone's feathers in all policy decisions?  Wouldn't we get more done and less undone in such a way?  

I've got a lot more work to do before I can present this argument to my friend, but I feel like I've got my head around something that makes sense to me.  At least, I did when I started.  Now it's another late Saturday evening, and I've written myself into exhaustion with this one draft.  I'm so glad I don't have to present policy every day at school, that I can kick back with easy good humor while unraveling the Salem Witch Trials, Senator McCarthy, and The Crucible simultaneously for eager teenagers.  Now THERE'S "perception is reality" at work!

Dream Weaver

After an accidental three-hour Friday evening nap, I stumbled across Coal Miner's Daughter on some movie channel while I was eating my dinner in the middle of the night.  It'd been many years since I'd seen the whole thing, and I watched most of it, although I didn't remember so much annoying banjo music in it.  But hearing all those Loretta Lynn songs made me remember how I used to perform mini-concerts on the steps of our church at home when I was little, maybe three or four. 

We still lived in Skedee then, right across the street from the little white clapboard Methodist church, and those front steps went just high enough that I felt like I had a commanding stage for the whole street.  I probably owe a few apologies for those performances; I have no idea how many times I might have annoyed Bo and Evelyn Brown, who lived straight across the street, or Nancy, who lived in the former parsonage next door.  I never saw anyone watching, so I felt free to sing my heart out.  As I recall, I favored Tammy Wynette a little more than Loretta---Tammy seemed so much more coolly elegant, and she had a prettier name.  There were probably a few Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, and Hank Williams songs thrown in.  When the new house out at the elevator was still being built, I would imagine the back patio as my new stage, something of an upgrade because it looked out on an open pasture that could be filled with who knows how many star-struck fans applauding my stunning performances.  With more people around to catch me there, I don't think I was as exuberant with my performances, but I do remember riding my bicycle in giant figure-eights in the pristine garage, singing "Happiest Girl in the Whole USA." 

That dream of stages and stunning costumes carried me through a lot of years---far more than I care to admit.  A shy kid who really didn't like to fail at things, I didn't talk about that dream much except in joking, though I know now it was pretty obvious that I craved it.  It didn't really occur to me to long for any other profession, even as I learned the realities of life and survival and the long, long odds against making a name.  Even when I went to college, I chose radio broadcasting as my first degree at Rogers, unwilling to walk away from that abiding love of music that has passed through several generations of my family.  Only when I found that DJs make almost no money did I reluctantly decide I needed another path, and teaching opened before me with a stage far more suited to my talents than singing.  The classroom turned out to be more rewarding than any dream I could have thought up for myself. 

Of course, there were other dreams that came---and eventually went.  Like most girls, I thought at one time I really wanted a family:  marrying a farmer and having six kids seemed perfectly reasonable, a thought that now makes me infinitely grateful that God in His (or Her!) wisdom planned something else for me!  I love babies, can't get enough of them, but I'd have made an impatient, self-involved mother.  Marriage might be OK if I could be married only on weekends, or if I had a husband who traveled; I barely manage to take care of myself, and having to cook and clean for someone else after working all day would make me really cranky, I think.  There also was the dream of being a published poet that never really got beyond several angst-ridden poems and a lot of ideas for chapbook titles.  A creative writing teacher in college encouraged my talent in ways I couldn't have expected, but I was way too closed-up to ever think of sharing what seemed so incredibly personal at that time.  Actually, after learning at 30 that I'd suffered life-long depression and getting that under control, I lost the desire---and much of what talent I did have---to write my best work; that made even more sense to me when I learned that 33% of America's poet laureates have suffered from bi-polar disorder.  I could live in a gray world and write, or I could live in color and be happy and mostly wordless.  There was no pain in making the choice I did.

These days, my dreams, the waking ones, are mostly simple, but often, still, blue-sky thinking at its most deluded.  I dream of being able to wear cute shoes again, of returning to the days when I could take my feet for granted in flip-flops, flats with no arch support, and spiky heels that I could teach and walk campus in all day.  Dreams of being healthy and more confident, while more within reach now, will always require hard work and vigilance on my part, which I pray for always.  Then, too, there is that dream that everyone has but few find true: to be known and understood, to be the most important person in the world to someone.  Some would call it being in love, but it's just love, in many varieties.  I know I've been rich with it, so I try not to wish for more than my share. 

Dreams are, I believe, what keep all of us going; when we run out of dreams, we run out of a will to go on.  I've had the power to dream, to believe in myself enough to dream, ripped away before, and I know I don't ever want to experience it again.  So I will be brave enough to keep dreaming and confess my dreams to anyone who asks, for as long as I can wring a single thread of hope out of life---and there's a lot of life left out there.

Double Your Fun

On Christmas Eve of 1994, I was very anxious to get to my Grandma Brown's house in Pryor.  That would be my first chance to meet two little men who joined our family right after school had started that summer:  my brother's boys, Logan and Nolan.  They had been a bit of a surprise; until July, my sister-in-law had been told she was carrying one baby, and then a month before they arrived, it was discovered that Nolan had been hiding Logan all along.  Since they were born in South Dakota, I hadn't been able to see them until Christmas.  I walked in the house, walked straight to them lying side by side on a blanket on the living room floor, and fell helplessly in love with them, with their round Welker features and their big eyes with little bags under them, just like my brother.  Not one thing about that love has changed in the last 19 years.

Dear Nolan:

You are the coolest customer around with a dry, witty remark, and I know I have really accomplished something when I make you laugh.  Ever since you picked up a guitar, you've been a different kid, one more confident, but also with a little bit of a mask to hide behind.  But I still see you:  the little toddler who would growl at me, "Hugs, but no kisses!" when I threatened to kiss your whole face (and then did); the competitive brother who was dominate even when you were in the womb, and who was probably behind tricks like taking a door off its hinges when you were barely two; the eyebrow you would arch sky-high to express everything from skepticism to a punch line.  It may be that eyebrow was the first thing that made me realize that I would always love you best.

The twin language that you and your brother spoke gave you your first run as the family comedian.  You would yammer something at Logan, and he would start belly laughing at you; that just egged you on to go on another rant, keeping him laughing the whole time.  Once in a while, you'd let him get a work in edgewise, and you thought he was absolutely hysterical.  There was NO WAY I could watch that exchange and not laugh along with you both---it made me positively giddy, maybe because I was sure that you'd be little geniuses.  I'd give my eyeteeth to know what those conversations were about, but I feel privileged just to have witnessed them. 

Between the summer I spent there with you just before you turned a year old, and the trips down here that you took with Grandma and Papa, we had lots of time together.  You both loved going to Camp Texas (I don't know which of you started calling the grapefruit orchard that name) and staying in the ancient 13-foot camping trailer that was installed in the barn there.  Now we jokingly call it the Citrus Hilton, but you always called it the "cool camping trailer."  That time you spent with Grandma and Papa, I am sure, was one of the best times of their lives.  All their friends loved to have you along when you traveled, and you and Chris were all so well-behaved that I know they were and are incredibly proud of you all.

One of the most terrifying things I've ever known was when you had to have your bowel surgery at only two years old and couldn't eat or drink for nearly two weeks.  When your mom told me on the phone about you begging, "Dink, Mama, dink," I hung up the phone and wept the rest of the evening.  Your parents and grandparents were absolute towers of strength, but I've always been grateful I couldn't be there.  It still breaks my heart to thing of it.

Your little Terminator voice from childhood, though, can always make me laugh.  It was so dang funny.  It gave you and Logan both some odd pronunciations:  I lived in "Muhdroh" (Muldrow) and Sheri lived in "Chickenshakes" (Chickasha); while you loved music, you couldn't stand "guhl" (girl) songs by Logan's favorites like Shania Twain, Dixie Chicks, or Martina McBride.  And somehow, out of this time period, your nickname of Charlie Crab came about because you were tired of being pestered by somebody, so you told them your name was "Chawlie Cwab."  I can remember talking to your mom or dad on the phone at times, and I'd hear the most awful growling and roaring sounds from you and Logan, but they would say, "Oh, they're just wrestling."  I never had a moment's concern that you were competitive with each other, because even when you didn't agree, neither of you went far without the other.

When you and Logan started school, the different sides of your two personalities became more evident, and I was glad of it.  You have always been a little miniature of your dad as he is now, keeping your emotions in check, playing close to the vest, and popping off a smart remark when it applies and isn't meant to cause trouble.  In school, things came easy to you, and after a while, your attitude was usually an I-know-I-can-do-it-and-don't-have-to-prove-it coolness, an attitude I admired a little since I was more obsessive about grades, but which also worried me a bit.  Clearly, there was no need to worry; your Gates Scholarship is the true reflection of how hard you worked not just at being a good student, but a good man.

I love your attention to your music, and I hope that light will burn in your soul forever.  I know it because I had the same light and the same mask to put between me and the world, but not as much talent as you.  Keep your talent and your mind open to new ideas and experiences, and you'll be amazed at how the world will respond.  And have no fear in life, because you have a heart and spirit of faith that will brook no foolishness from anyone who would bring you down.  On the contrary, you are meant for great things we can't even imagine right now.  I thank God for the chance to see what those things will be.  Happy 19th Birthday, Charlie.

Love,

Cathy


Dear Logan,

You and your brother were never really identical to me; his face was rounder, while yours was more narrow at your jaw.  Your eyes had bit more of tilt to them, and the two things combined gave you a little elfin grin even as a baby---you still have a hint of it now.  That little elfish face is the first thing I think of when I realize that there was no chance that I would ever forget that I would always love you best. 

You've always been like your dad was as a little boy:  sweet, quiet, dreamier, a little bit of a wanderer who didn't get in a big hurry about a lot of stuff---unless there were bugs to escape from.  In fact, I've always understood your mind a little better than others realize, because we are a lot alike.  I could get lost in a book at school and not hear the teacher calling on me until she called me two or three times; you've taken a lot of kidding for that sort of thing from all of us, sometimes when you're reading, sometimes when you're just thinking your thoughts.  We just go far away in our minds at times.  We both felt driven to do well in school; second best was not really good enough for us, most of the time.  And we both could get totally involved in music and block out everything else going on around us.  NO ONE in the family will ever forget that video of you at the beach when the tamale man's music started in the background, and you began twitching your backside along with the music as you walked toward the surf!  From your early days playing piano, to your sax, fiddle, mandolin, and bass talents, you show so much promise for a future that has art at the heart of your life.  You've done a much better job of expanding on that than I did, and I can't tell you how proud I am of that.

When you were little, you were more of a daredevil than Nolan.  Grandma talks about how they would have to watch you as a toddler because you would jump into water of any depth, anywhere.  As time went by, you became more cautious, but you also were a gentler person as a result.  When your little sister was born a few months before you turned 10, she owned you from the first minute.  You were always the first one at her crib, because you "just couldn't stand to hear her cry."  She was so attached to you, too, that she wouldn't even let us change her diaper unless "Ogie" was holding her hand.  I think that experience is what gave you the talent and patience to work at the Club E after-school program for the younger students when you were in high school.  These kinds of experiences make you more tender-hearted and will guarantee some heartbreak in life, but they make you a rare and exceptional young man.

You've taken a lot of kidding from the family about your dislike of bugs, especially flying ones, but you might not know that I took the same kidding for a long time.  It's hysterically funny to remember you as a little bitty guy, running away screaming from what you universally called a "wahs-hoppah" (anything with wings and legs), looking for someone with a "fly-flapper" to kill it.  Grandma always thought I was silly for being terrified of spiders and ticks, but you and I, we just have a healthy respect for things that should not be sharing space with us!

I'm afraid I'm to blame for your nickname "Slick"; one day you were running through the family room at Grandma and Papa's house, and you slipped on a magazine and fell.  I looked up, said, "Way to go, Slick," and didn't think anything about it.  But Papa latched on to that name because it was when Bill Clinton was in office, and they called him Slick Willie because he told some lies....which you had a tiny problem with at the time---things like "Who left the ketchup out?"   "Not me," you'd reply, although no one else had used ketchup in days.  So that's my fault, and I apologize, but you're stuck with it, you know.

I think the "singer" you and Nolan had is one of my favorite memories from when you two were little.  The little tape player had two microphones that you could sing into along with the tape.  The only problem was that the two of you didn't agree on most music.  But I remember that you both loved that Tim McGraw song "Where the Green Grass Grows."  I can hear the two of you singing along, "I'm gonna live where the green grass grows, watch my corn pop up in rows," and really coming out with a distinctive "pop!" on that word---I still hear the song that way, more than 15 years later, every time I hear it. 

And, too, I still see the sweet-natured boy beneath the man, now a college student with a Gates Scholarship to his credit and the whole world opening before him.  I see your curious nature and brave spirit in the face of change, leaving the life you have always known for one that you will choose, after careful consideration and heartfelt prayer.  I see just the palest, shimmering reflection of who I was at your age, knowing that you will have and make some better choices than I did, because you are wiser and more level-headed.   I love having been a part of your life growing up and will look forward to your next two decades as much as the last two.  Happy 19th Birthday, Logan!

Love,

Cathy