default category
the blog is all about me anyway, so most likely a post will be at least a little about me
If we should weep when clowns put on their show,
If we should stumble when musicians play,
Time will say nothing but I told you so.
There are no fortunes to be told, although,
Because I love you more than I can say,
If I could tell you I would let you know.
The winds must come from somewhere when they blow,
There must be reasons why the leaves decay;
Time will say nothing but I told you so.
Perhaps the roses really want to grow,
The vision seriously intends to stay;
If I could tell you I would let you know.
Suppose all the lions get up and go,
And all the brooks and soldiers run away;
Will Time say nothing but I told you so?
If I could tell you I would let you know.
When I was a senior in high school (1994) I went on a trip to London with my school. I was in awe pretty much the whole time. Not that I hadn’t traveled, I was just so in love with London I could hardly believe I was really there. If I had had a digital camera I would have run out of space on my memory card the first day. I especially loved riding the Underground. After all I grew up in a town with a handful of elevators, a crappy bus system, and no escalators.
On the Underground I started to notice poetry in some of the ad spaces. I didn’t know until way later (enter the advent of the internet) that this was a culture thing.
Poems on the Underground was launched in 1986. The programme was the brainchild of American writer Judith Chernaik, whose aim was to bring poetry to the wide ranging audience of passengers on the Underground.
All I knew was, I was seeing poems I hadn’t read before. There was one that caught my eye and I wrote it in my journal. I don’t know what it was that spoke to me in Auden’s words. Maybe it was the repetition, maybe the odd rhyme scheme, maybe the message, but whatever it was I came home wanting to know more poetry by W.H. Auden. It was a librarian friend who explained villanelle style poetry to me. I tried to write poems in the same style, but I am a hopeless writer. I got a book of his poetry and devoured it. Four Weddings and a Funeral came out that same summer and featured another Auden poem that just about broke my heart.
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,The connections just keep coming. The college I went to, Sweet Briar College, actually has an Auden collection in the library. I don’t actually know what that means, because I was never brave enough to ask about it.
Looking back I wish my senior quote in my high school yearbook had been from another Auden poem, Leap Before You Look.
A solitude ten thousand fathoms deep Sustains the bed on which we lie, my dear; Although I love you, you will have to leap; Our dream of safety has to disappear.
I would have just quoted the last line, but I put the whole final stanza here to give context. I was so afraid to leave the safety of my hometown, my friends, the only house I ever really remembered (there had been an apartment until I was 3), my parents and my sister. Virginia is a long way from Vermont in so many different ways. And I really had to leap before I looked, or I might not have gone. I am so glad I did.
I had no idea what I was going to experience in college or how it would shape my life. I wanted all the answers up front, but they weren’t there for me. To be trite, I had to let time be the one to tell me so.
When I was 8, if you had asked what I wanted to be when I grew up I would have told you I wanted to be a teacher. I don’t think I ever thought I would be anything else. I mean, sometimes I thought about owning a store, or a cafe. I might have dreamed of being a dancer or an actor. But for sure the only thing I ever really wanted to be was a teacher.
In October of my senior year of college several of my friends and I went on a trip. I was sitting at dinner with one of the girls I didn’t know as well and was asking her questions. I asked what she was going to do after college. She had no idea. She chose her major because it was something that she was pretty good at. Until then it had never occurred to me that anyone was going to graduate from college without knowing what they wanted to do. I thought that’s what college was, the gateway to what you were going to be when you grew up. Looking back most of my friends are not working in fields related to their majors, but then, that would have never occurred to me.
When I was a kid if you asked me what my favorite things were I would have said reading and playing on my computer. This may not be so strange now (the computer part), but I grew up in the 1980s. I’ve had a computer since I was 2 or 3. I don’t remember not having a computer. My memory of my first computer is that it was a CBM, but the screen on that one looks too big. I also had a Commodore 64 and a Tandy. I had all sorts of learning games, including the original Math Blaster and something called a Koala Pad. All the images on my first computer were green on black and created by ASCII text.
Here I am now. 34 years old and wrapping up my 11th year of teaching. 11 years of running a computer lab in an elementary school and 10 years teaching reading, too. A job that didn’t even exist in my elementary school days, hopefully leading kids to jobs that don’t even exist now.
This month’s NaBloPoMo theme is “looking up”. Here are some things that are “looking up” in my life right now.
It is only 2 weeks until my birthday.
It is only 2 weeks until my son’s birthday.
School is nearly over for the year.
The weather is getting better.
I am feeling pretty good.
My son is starting to walk.
My house looks good, on the outside.
I am feeling very confident at work.
I am not even going to list the things that are “looking down”.
I am kicking off my renewed interested in blogging. I know I am not the most interesting writer, but I am going to try.
When I was in high school a friend gave me a book called 14,000 Things to be Happy About. I started a list of my happy things in 1993. When I stopped I had 223. I doubt I will ever get to 14,000, but I thought I might try to hit 1000 in my lifetime. I added to the list last year, and then again last night. Here are my latest additions that make me happy:
Mamacita started her own 6 word Saturdays last week. Show My Face started it, but Mamacita learned about it from Magical Mystical Teacher.
The idea came from a book Joe bought me for Christmas. The book is: Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous & Obscure and it was edited by Smith Magazine. The book is based on Ernest Hemingway’s short story, “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” The idea is to tell a story or describe your life in six words and the book is a collection of these. A few examples from the book jacket: “Found true love, married someone else.” “After Harvard had baby with crackhead.” It’s interesting reading and has set me thinking in many directions so it might be worth checking out if that’s your kind of thing. ~Show My Face
Labor Movement: Thanks for the weekend! >link<
So last September I was tired all the time. My breasts hurt and I had to pee 3 times a night. I had no idea what was wrong with me. Duh! Finally in late September I took a pregnancy test. And then I took another one. And another. And needless to say, I have a baby now. Probably my pregnancy would have been a great thing to blog about. Especially since many of my favorite bloggers were pregnant this year too (her, her, and her off the top of my head). But I really didn’t think it would be all that interesting to any of you.
Anyway (not anyways), I am back and I will be trying to blog every day this month. The theme on NaBloPoMo is beautiful, so let me leave you with something beautiful from the last year.
PS Today is one year from the date of conception.
We got home around 5 yesterday. I was asleep by 9. I have slept nearly all day today. Darn good thing I didn’t have to go to work.
I still haven’t even downloaded my pictures yet. I think I took well over 400. It was such a nice week. We had good weather several days and some rain and fog other days. We were just enough busy to feel like we were doing something, but had plenty of time for doing nothing. I had planned to post day for day (so today I would have posted about last Monday), but I am not pulled together yet. Hopefully, tomorrow.
I have something in common with Dooce. How crazy is that?
Okay, maybe it was just that first sentence, but I know exactly what my dad is trying to say when he doesn’t say it. And when people ask me if my parents like Jon, I’m all, like Jon? Hmm. How do I put this? They think Jesus sent him.
When people ask me if my husband and parents get along, I usually say, “Well, if we ever got a divorce, I think my parents would really miss me.” My father tells people they were sure I would never get married (I was 24 when we started dating; 26 when we married).
But my mother didn’t think I would ever get married, not when I was a spinsterly 24 years old. Who would want a woman so shriveled up by life? So I got mine early. And then along came Jon and he was all, I like ’em shriveled up!
Six years later (on Sunday), I am not sure where I would be if he hadn’t been willing to marry me.
