Wayfarer Journal is on Hiatus...

I'm sorry, but I have to set blogging aside for a while.

I have a Master's degree to finish, and I have a full plate on top of that. Something has to give.

I'll be back soon, though.

It'll be worth the wait. There's lots to tell!

Random Radio…

I travel with the rest of my house to the seacoast area of NH on a fairly regular basis. My car radio has two FM bands, so I can have two groups of preset stations on it. One is for my home area, and the other is for when I’m in NH. Sometime in the early summer of this year I was looking for something new to listen to. I wasn’t sure what I really wanted, but I knew that none of the stations I have as presets were offering it. I stumbled upon 93.7 Mike FM by accident, but fell in love with it instantly. It’s just about the only station I listen to when I’m in NH or near Boston. Sadly, they don't reach all the way to where I live in western MA, but they do broadcast online, so I can enjoy them on the couch while I'm laptopping. Praise Jesus for the internet!!

Do you listen to online radio? Do you listen to any radio at all, or is it all about the iPod? Do tell!

What have you done? (Part 2 of 3)

51. Visited Ireland

52. Been heartbroken longer then you were actually in love

--I’ve been married to a woman I love very much for almost 12 years, so even counting all the separate periods of brokenheartedness I’ve had (not that there have been many, mind you), I come nowhere near saying yes to this.

53. In a restaurant, sat at a stranger’s table and had a meal with them

--No, but what a nice idea! I don’t see all that many people dining alone, though. Certainly, I don’t get to dine alone myself all that often either these days, but I like the idea of this one.

54. Visited Japan

--Not yet, but as a student of Buddhism, this would be a real experience. I’d do it on my way to the Shaolin Temple in the Songshan Mountains of China.

55. Milked a cow

--There is something very special about the feeling of your head resting in the warm spot just between her abdomen and her leg, and feeling her lean into you just a little as you begin to milk her. It’s a very special sort of shared experience.

56. Alphabetized your cds

--I have done it once or twice, but I remember better where each one is at by its place in the pile. Just don’t move the pile!

57. Pretended to be a superhero

--I led a very rich internal life as a child.

58. Sung karaoke

--I’ll dance all day and be goofy in public, but my singing is much more personal to me. Something about karaoke just doesn’t make me feel right.

59. Lounged around in bed all day

--Glorious!!

60. Posed nude in front of strangers

--I’m not sure anyone needs to see what I’ve got, but I’m not afraid to lay it out there.

61. Gone scuba diving

--I would love to, though!

62. Kissed in the rain

--[again with the coy smile]

63. Played in the mud

--Playing soccer in the rain is some of the most fun I have ever had in my life! You can slide tackle someone and go for 20 yards! Whoo! Righteous!

64. Played in the rain

--See #63, above.

65. Gone to a drive-in theater

--I watched Nightwing (killer bats attack an Indian reservation in New Mexico) when I was 10 years old. NOT the movie to see outdoors, from the top of a VW Combi, at a drive-in with bats flying all around.

66. Visited the Great Wall of China

--I’ll do it on the way to #54

67. Started a business

--Not in the truest sense. I took over my dad’s independent sign business and ran it for 3 years or so. I learned graphic design through that experience, but the erratic paychecks made it tough to continue without making a huge commitment.

68. Fallen in love and not had your heart broken

--See #52.

69. Toured ancient sites.

--Pompeii and Herculaneum, Siracusa.

70. Taken a martial arts class

--Helped start the Lohan School of Shaolin.

71. Played D&D for more than 6 hours straight

--See the following… Orcs and Cheese Doodles

72. Gotten married

…at least once!

73. Been in a movie

--On TV a couple of times, but not on the big screen.

74. Crashed a party

75. Gotten divorced

…only once!

76. Gone without food for 5 days

--Twice. Once because I had the flu in Brazil and couldn’t so much as get out of bed. Once when I had my gallbladder out.

77. Made cookies from scratch

--My wife makes world famous cookies, so I don’t do it anymore.

78. Won first prize in a costume contest

79. Ridden a gondola in Venice

80. Gotten a tattoo

--I’ve never really found anything that was worth having permanently and indelibly scratched into me. I’m not above doing it, though, if the right thing comes along.

81. Gone white water rafting

See #31.

82. Been on television news programs as an “expert”

--Pfft!

83. Got flowers for no reason

--Not flowers, no.

84. Performed on stage

--Lots of times. The process of putting on a show is just too damn stressful.

85. Been to Las Vegas

--Visited from 1992-1998. Loved it there! Hell, it’s summer 330 days a year!

86. Recorded music

87. Eaten shark

--Does it taste like chicken?

88. Had a one-night stand

--Was asked to have one once. I practically ran away. Of course, the cold sore on her lip probably had something to do with that.

89. Gone to Thailand

90. Bought a house

--Bought a mortgage. I get the house in 1,000 years.

91. Been in a combat zone

--Only in the area that used to be the Combat Zone in Boston, and that was by mistake.

92. Buried one/both of your parents

--My parents will disappear quietly into the sunset when it is their time. I am not afraid to bury them, but I’ll be surprised if I have to.

93. Been on a cruise ship

--I have no desire to do a cruise, but I would totally get passage to someplace like Europe on a freighter or something. That’s my kind of experience!

94. Spoken more than one language fluently

--With perfect fluency? No. The levels at which I speak the six languages I know range from OK to Very Good, depending on how often I’m called to use them. French and Spanish top the list right now because I teach them. My German “sogt”.

95. Performed in Rocky Horror

96. Raised children

--Working on it, anyway.

97. Followed your favorite band/singer on tour

98. Created and named your own constellation of stars

99. Taken an exotic bicycle tour in a foreign country

--I very much want to tour Europe by bike (I’ve done a couple of tours in the US).

100. Picked up and moved to another city to just start over

--Moving to Las Vegas was sort of for that reason, but it’s complicated. Someday, perhaps, that story will get told, too.

Countdown to M.Ed. -- 2 courses.

One of them is a research class. Action research. Sounds all superhero-y doesn’t it?

Action research is the kind done to directly affect current practice (in my case, teaching practice), so it’s supposed to have something to do with what I’m doing in my classroom currently. I’m not doing anything relative to my current teaching, though. Instead, I’m doing research on teaching practices in schools and programs that work primarily with foster/adopted children, in preparation to start the Community School. More on that in a later post.

I have things about my current teaching I could explore, but I’ve been so thoroughly disgusted with my teaching this year that examining it objectively would just be too irritating.

I’ll admit it. It was a tough year. Being gone the first two months of the year, then trying to make up for that lost time while still trying to figure out which way is up with graduate school kicking back in and No Child Left Behind rearing its useless, ugly head.

I feel like my students didn’t learn a god. damn. thing.

Worse than that is the nagging, gnawing feeling I have that I didn’t teach them anything. They went through this whole year and got nothing worthwhile from me, and when I look back at why, there is so little that I can honestly say I could have done differently. I don’t have any problem taking responsibility for my teaching, and I’ll own up to the fact that I made decisions that meant my teaching was less inspired because I had other things to do, but it happened the way it had to. I’m not happy with it, though, and I’m carrying a little resentment at having to make decisions that don’t support the part of my life that really nourishes my soul.

Maybe that’s what I should have researched: The effect of real-world bullshit on veteran World Language teachers. I could call my thesis paper “Conneries and Sandeces”*

* The words for “bullshit” in French and Spanish, respectively.

What have you done? (Part 1 of 3)

Wifeness posted to her site a list of 150 life-changing experiences, and bolded those she has done. I enjoy reliving my adventures and this was a fun exercise, so I’m adding it here. I have to do it in segments, though. Here is part 1. The ones I did are in blue …

01. Bought everyone in the bar a drink
--Not when beer is $4 a glass!

02. Swam with wild dolphins
--Does swimming with a wild Miami Dolphin fan count?

03. Climbed a mountain
--I’ve done this lots of times. My reward for reaching the top? Taking a good, long look at the panoramic vista laid out before me, then go find a shady spot to take a nap.

04. Taken a Ferrari for a test drive
--It was a Porsche, not a Ferrari, and it was wicked!

05. Been inside the Great Pyramid

06. Held a tarantula
--I had one when I was a kid. It was in a jar of formaldehyde. I think it was a present from my dad.

07. Taken a candlelit bath with someone
--[smiles coyly]

08. Said ‘I love you’ and meant it
--I mean it every single time. Don’t say things you don’t mean. It’s, well, demeaning.

09. Hugged a tree
--It’s really quite nurturing to the soul. I highly recommend it!

10. Bungee jumped
--HELL no!

11. Visited Paris
--Several times and it has been magical every, single time. It is among my favorite places to travel, especially with students.

12. Watched a lightning storm at sea

13. Stayed up all night long and saw the sun rise
--Isn’t that what all-nighters in college were for? I also used to work the graveyard audit shift. It killed me. I could never get my biorhythms tuned just right.

14. Seen the Northern Lights

15. Gone to a huge sports game
--Does an early game of the World Cup count? (thank you, Wifeness! That was the best birthday present EVAH!)

16. Walked the stairs to the top of the leaning Tower of Pisa
--No, and was I bitter! The tower was closed when I was in Pisa. I do, however, have some great photos of the duomo, the tower and this Spanish girl being mobbed for her little bag of popcorn by 45,000 pigeons

17. Grown and eaten your own vegetables
--I lived on a small farm for part of my childhood. We also grow a paltry amount of produce at Wayfarer House (the count from the garden this year includes several salads worth of lettuce, a handful of cherry-sized tomatoes that SiSi ate as soon as she saw them and 3 cucumbers).

18. Touched an iceberg
--I’d do it, but I’d much prefer to touch a palm tree!

19. Slept under the stars
--I love to do that! I’m eagerly awaiting the chance to take my kids out camping. I have not been since Wifeness and I went desert camping before we had kids, and I miss it.

20. Changed a baby’s diaper
--Enough to change a landfill. Have I mentioned that NiNi is out of them, as of about 3 weeks ago? Gods be praised! Of course Buffy and Harold just brought a new baby into the house, so the number of children in diapers still equals two, but at least they’re not MY children.

21. Taken a trip in a hot air balloon
--No, but unlike #10, above, I think I would enjoy this.

22. Watched a meteor shower
--During an event covered under #13, above. It involved, as coincidence would have it, libation covered under #23, below.

23. Gotten drunk on champagne
--I have never been drunk. No, really. I never have. I have felt the buzz from alcohol, but nothing more than that. You see, I have this curious relationship with spirits. I get drowsy very quickly and lose my taste for it when I begin to have too much. I think it’s somehow related to the mechanism that leaves me intolerant of most drugs (including Sudafed and cough syrup).

24. Given more than you can afford to charity
--If anything, we don’t give enough to formal charity, but we work hard to give in different ways to different people, according to what we have in quantity. Charity should not always be monetary.

25. Looked up at the night sky through a telescope.
--UncleBubba had one when we lived in Las Vegas. The moon looked bigger, but not stunningly so. I decided it wasn’t worth the money to buy one.

26. Had an uncontrollable giggling fit at the worst possible moment
--There’s a great story about this from my time as a phone canvasser for the League of Conservation Voters. It involves me and Shirley, an inadvertent punch of her speakerphone button and, at top volume and just as a generous supporter of the organization has answered her phone, the theme to The Muppet Show. I couldn’t help it, and worse, I could NOT stop!!

27. Had a food fight
--Michelle’s parents are probably still finding chocolate chip cookie batter in their kitchen from that day 21 years ago!

28. Bet on a winning horse
--My karma does not allow me to win often when I gamble.

29. Asked out a stranger
--Not a complete stranger, but I did once get the nerve to ask a girl out who was staying for several weeks at the hotel where I was working. Summed up in the event covered under #22, above.

30. Had a snowball fight
--It’s all fun and games until someone (usually me) loses an eye.

31. Screamed as loudly as you possibly could
--While negotiating whitewater on the St. Croix river. You have to scream like that at the end. It’s a law. Plus, it feels really good!

32. Held a lamb
--Not on the farm where I grew up, though. We didn’t raise sheep. We did raise goats, though, and there are a couple of times when I would sit in the early morning by the wood stove with a newborn kid in my lap. They smell pungent, but not unpleasant.

33. Seen a total eclipse
--Well, not directly, of course! That would be silly! You’d burn your eyes out and go blind! Or is that that other thing you're not supposed to do...?

34. Ridden a roller coaster
--One time. Never again. See #10, above.

35. Hit a home run
--Two. Including a grand slam, no less!

36. Danced like a fool and not cared who was looking
--I could deny this, but I have way too many students as witnesses to confirm it. “Uh, Wayfarer, you need to stop that and NEVER DO IT AGAIN.”

37. Adopted an accent for an entire day
--I do this regularly for shorter periods of time (my kids tell me to “talk in your regular voice, please!”), but the only time I can think about that was for that long was during a trip last year to England. It was to practice. I was surprised how hard it was to do for all day!

38. Actually felt happy about your life, even for just a moment
--I can honestly say I feel this way far more often than I do not. I am blessed to be living a life of my choosing, in keeping with my karma, that brings me incalculable contentment and stimulation.

39. Had two hard drives for your computer
--At work, yes. I don’t need two at home. I just don’t need that much space.

40. Visited all 50 states.
--If we interpret “visit” to mean getting out of the car and spending at least 3 hours walking around, the number is 22. I have driven through 33, to date.

41. Taken care of someone who was shit faced
--Thank the universe, no. I’m a sympathetic vomiter.

42. Had amazing friends
--Had?? Have!!

43. Danced with a stranger in a foreign country
It’s how I learned the lambada!

44. Watched wild whales

45. Stolen a sign
--If you know me from college, do NOT comment on this one!

46. Backpacked in Europe
--Fred and I went from Rome to Paris over the course of a month.

47. Taken a road-trip
--Armstrong, Ontario or BUST! (it ended up bust, but the actual adventure more than made up for it)

48. Gone rock climbing
--Red Rock, NV; St. George, UT. Look, Ma! No ropes!

49. Midnight walk on the beach
--Adrianna and I walked on the cape one night during spring break. Don’t get the wrong idea, here. It was totally platonic.

50. Gone sky diving
--Again, HELL no!

Installment two coming soon!

Finally, some room to breathe!

It’s mid-August and grad school is done. Well, actually, it’s not done. It’s more like halftime. I’ve got two weeks to get to the locker room, cool off, regroup. Maybe get some orange juice. Then, it’s back out onto the field for one more semester. Going into the locker room, I can say I’m ahead—by a healthy margin. That’s good. Protecting the lead, though, means doing a whole lot of research over the next 3-4 months. I’m looking forward to it, but it’s going to mean a lot of crazybusy and I am very determined to be finished by Christmas. There can be no overtime. My constitution won’t take it. I’ve been doing this for two years while working full time, coaching, being a papa and surviving a more-exciting-than-necessary near death experience (it sounds weird to say that, but it was). I’m tired, and I want the game to be over when the whistle blows.

Hey! That soccer analogy wasn’t so bad!

I have had to let a great many things slide over the last 8 months—certification review, school prep, house work, yard work, paperwork, a partridge in a pear tree... I’m not excited about everything that’s going to be waiting for me during Christmas vacation to catch up on, but I’m just not interested in doing anything that I have to work too hard at during these two weeks I have off. Blog writing, at least, does not qualify as taxing. Truth be told, it’s kind of therapeutic. I’ve always enjoyed being able to get things out of my brain through writing and it’s been tough not to really take the time to do that properly the last little while.

It’s so great to finally have this time! I’ve been reveling since Wednesday (the day I submitted the Review of Literature for my thesis) in being able to do some of the most mundane things. I cooked dinner for the first time in, like, six months. A nice dinner, too, if I do say so myself. Of course, the kids didn’t like the summer squash. Apparently, you just can’t put enough butter on summer squash to make it appealing to the under-5 set. I mowed the lawn before it threatened to overrun the house, and I mowed it at a time that wasn’t the hottest part of the day. I got to rent a movie and actually watch it. The Name of the Rose. A classic of literature by Umberto Eco that was made into a movie in the 80’s. I read the book when I was in high school, but I haven’t seen the film in a long time. Christian Slater is in it and he looks about 12 years old. It has the campy look to it that all movies from the 80’s now do (what does that say for ME??!), but the attention to detail is incredible, and it’s great fodder for the fiction writing I play with. I even got to go disc golfing yesterday. There’s a course about 30 minutes away, and I was able to get in a round while my kids were off with Suzanne. I’m going kayaking on Monday. I got one for my birthday in July, but I’ve only had time to go out briefly once. I have two weeks to go out 3 days a week, and I’m totally looking forward to it.

That’s the extent of my vacation. A lot of people claim that it’s unfair that teachers get their summers off. I try not to get on my soapbox about it, but in the 10 years I’ve been teaching, I have NEVER had more than 3 weeks off from school. I can’t vouch for the rest of the people in my profession, but I, for one, don’t get to just walk away from my job during vacations. I’m always reworking lesson plans, searching for materials, trying to do things better, faster, stronger. I’d much rather do that and have the nine months of teaching go smoothly than I would relax for those few short extra weeks and have the rest of the year be a disorganized pain in the butt. The 10 weeks I was out this past year, for example, made this the most stressful, frenetic school year I have ever had. It absolutely wore me out! I hope never to have to repeat that.

...and the New Car comes in--with accessories!

After extended research and a short survey of what was available for purchase within our budget, I decided on the following.





Those of you who know what I drove before are undoubtedly scratching your heads in wonderment.

A station wagon? Really??

I'll admit she was not my first choice, but let us review what the requirements were. [Click Here]. Go ahead. I'll wait.

Based on these criteria, I got what I wanted. This car meets ALL of wifeness' requirements (although the ugly factor is, I suppose, a matter of personal preference, she did not say it was too ugly to drive.). It also meets ALL BUT ONE of my own (there was NOTHING out there with a sunroof! What the crap?!?! Who wouldn't want a sunroof??).

She is a decided step down from the 4-Runner, but given the budget constraints and the fact that, frankly, an SUV doesn't meet my driving needs (I drive 70+ highway miles a day during school and no off-road driving), she presents a perfectly good solution. The biggest downside is the POS stereo. I'm grateful for the cassette player because I listen to books on tape a lot, but who doesn't put a CD player in a 2001 model of any car out there?? Come on! Oh, well. Christmas is coming. (hint, hint, Wifeness :] )

Also, please note the birthday present on the top of my new ride. A great big thank you to Wifeness for organizing the funds to pay for it, and to Caleb and Maeve and AuntieAlex for contributing to my sanity! I've been wanting a kayak for a while because our 14' canoe is just too big and bulky to take out alone. This one is much smaller (9'6") and much lighter (39 lbs). It's just perfect for me to take out for an afternoon of flatwater exploration! It's not really a whitewater boat and is not real fast in stronger current, but I don't do much of that stuff. Right now, all I really want is to go find a lake or stretch of quiet water on a river and poke around. In a couple of years, I hope to add to the fleet a longer boat I can use to do overnights and ocean touring. By then, maybe I'll have time.

5 Things (+1 Thing)...

Perhaps out of a desire to move beyond the stress of my paper, I was inspired by Chili’s post to think about the things that make me happy to be alive. Here are just some of the countless things (in no particular order):

1. Summer. Give me summer with all its warmth and sun, its long days and electric nights! I am invigorated, recharged and comforted all at the same time by this time of year. I just spend a lot of time sighing contentedly. It’s the season when I get things done, but when I don’t work too hard. I love to go outside and be active, but I also get to be introspective and read for pleasure (well, most years). I get to go for walks at 10pm without wearing long pants. I can go swimming outdoors! Not that the other seasons don’t have things I like, too, but summer is just so much better, so much more RIGHT. I enjoy spring and all its vibrant energy. Fall is nice, especially because the cozy clothes come out. Winter can just kiss my ass.

2. My time with the Wayfarer Community. More days of the week than not, I get to share space with at least one person (apart, of course, from my lovely wife and my darling daughters) whose presence brings me joy. I love it that there are so many wonderful people in my house all the time, and that they truly feel at home here! I love that they contribute to the peace and sanctity of Wayfarer House by sharing themselves by just being who they are. I love that Community Dinner means a whole lot of friends, food and fellowship. Each one of these people is a blessing of incalculable worth, and I work very hard both to nurture and celebrate them. If you’re a member of the Wayfarer Community, thank you! If you’re not, you totally should be! We’re a hoot!

3. The things I do to be creative. Muppetry, woodworking, writing and DnD are just some of the things that enrich my life. Sadly, of late I have not been able to do any of them because my time is necessarily committed to other endeavors (I need to be done with grad school!!!!) I enjoy being creative. It wakens all of me in a way that is difficult to describe.

4. Travel. Another of the things that have had to be sacrificed of late. In my lifetime, I have been to some of the most beautiful places on this planet, had some of the most exciting experiences and met some of the most interesting and amazing people because I said, “What the hell! I’ve never been there before…” Here are just some of the things I’ve seen and done:
--Swarms of jellyfish in Florida
--4 lanes of 90km/h traffic on a 2-lane Italian country road
--Getting burglarized at knife point while waiting for the bus in Bahia
--Spending the night in Victoria Station, London
--Taking a train through a forest fire in Texas
--The sun setting over the perfectly conical island of Stromboli
--Being babied by Mormon girls while crossing the English channel during a perfect storm
--Playing soccer with Brazilians
--Learning to play bridge from someone who you would totally adopt as your grandma
--Learning to dance the lambada from someone who you would totally NOT consider your grandma
--Sitting at the base of the basilica at Sacré Coeur with throngs of Parisians while eating rotisserie chicken with your students and watching the street vendors scatter like roaches when the light switch is flipped because the local constables are trying to round them up
--Watching real roaches scatter every time I opened the front door to my flat that overlooked the Presidential Palace in Rio de Janeiro--big, mutant, junkie roaches.

What wonderful memories!

5. Teaching. This is sort of explained in #s 3 and 4, above, but it’s more than being creative or sharing experience. It’s also kind of doing right by all the blessings I have been given in my life. It’s a karmic thing, in the way Rama-Kandra explains it in Matrix: Revolutions…

“Karma is a word…A way of saying 'what I am here to do.'

6. The Women of Wayfarer House. I’m a guy and don’t do mushy real well for public consumption, but my wife and daughters touch my heart in ways that continually amaze me. I meditate sometimes about my life before and I recall lots of good memories, but my life is so much more rich and satisfying now that I am with them. They are good karma and I am a better man, a better teacher, a better husband and father, a better lots of things for their presence in my life. To finish Rama-Kandra’s quote:

“I do not resent my karma – I am grateful for it. Grateful for my wonderful wife, for my beautiful daughters*. They are gifts, and so I do what I must do to honour them.”

I cannot hope to honour them as well as they do me, but I consider it a happy challenge to try.

* sic

I am SOOOO tired!

I have a single paper to finish for this session of graduate school, and it's kicking my ass. I want it to be done, but I'm finding myself dragging it out because I'm just not capable of using my brain any longer. That's all I want to say.

Happy Birthday, Love Dad...

My father sent me a card from Florida and told me to get me one of these for my birthday on him... Thanks, Dad! It was yummy!


And thanks to Alex for providing the wonderful conversation that went along with it. I had a great time!

It's All-About-Me Day!

...to me! I am 37 today.

Forza Italia! (World Cup images)

Vincono Gli Azzurri!!

Congratulazioni ai campioni del mondo!

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Mais, pourquoi, Zizou?!?

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Acho que não. Brasil va embora...

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Die nächste große Hoffnung für Amerika?

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No más...

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I can't wait!!

World Cup Takes To The Links...

For those of you who don't know, I have been actively following the World Cup of Soccer. Thanks to the Spanish language network Univision, I have able to watch (or record) nearly all of the games live. Apart from being able to passionately engage in my one true fanatacism related to sports, I get to experience the games in a language--and from the point of view of a culture--that is as as wild about the sport, and this event, as I am.

If you've ever watched international soccer, especially if it's broadcast on a foreign language network, you will agree that there is a more intense energy to the way it is announced than you'll ever hear on ABC or ESPN. Announcers are enthusiastic in describing even the most mundane action and, whenever the ball gets close to the goal, the tone of the announcers rises and becomes more fervent, rising to a crescendo as the player takes the shot and, if he scores, you'll hear the most recognizable sound in international sports simultaneously on televisions and on the lips of viewers in living rooms, restaurants, bars and offices all over the world...

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!!!!

SiSi, my four-year old daughter, has been an eager student of soccer during this time. She has learned a great deal about soccer as a sport, and has been taken a real interest in watching the World Cup on television. She asks about why the players fall down so much and pretend to be hurt ("Did he get a pain in his leg THIS time, Papa?") and knows how to recognize when the ball goes out of bounds, what happens during a penalty kick and what to shout when the ball goes into the net...

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!!!!

This weekend, the U.S. Women's Open golf tournament was held in Newport, Rhode Island. The final round of this event was broadcast on network television, and Wifeness had the television tuned to it as background noise while she napped on the couch. She wasn't feeling well that day. Both girls were home, and had been playing in their bedroom. SiSi came into the living room to watch some TV just as Annika Sorenstam sank the 12th hole for birdie. She watched this happen and did what she thought she was supposed to do. She raised her arms and, in true World Cup style, announced...

The old car goes out...

I posted some time ago about the fact that my truck was on its way out. Well, she went and, in true Wayfarer House fashion, did it with style and in a way that you would never have figured.

It all happened on the last day of school for me. June 30th. A beautiful day, and a productive one! My grades were in. My classroom was clean and packed (they were due to clean out the space to do some construction). My truck was loaded to the gills with the stuff that comes home for the summer (Mbungo, plants, calendar, videos, texts and work to review, my podium that needs to have the top rebuilt, etc.), and I was thinking about what to make for supper that night as I pulled off the highway up the ramp to the stop sign to get on the back road that takes me to home. That's when she stalled.

I said, "That's odd. I haven't stalled my truck in years." Then I tried to start her again. She wanted to. She really wanted to, but the smoke started billowing from under the hood and I just knew this was the end. The thing was, I was in a tricky place. This off ramp has a little bit of a bend to it that makes it tough to see too far ahead as your approaching the stop sign. It was a busy traffic day and lots of people were exiting from the highway waaaaaay too fast. Not a good place to die, baby.

I quickly call AAA. I tell them in a calm, but urgent voice where I am, and that I'd appreciate it if they'd get someone here a little faster than they normally do since my truck's fat ass is hanging out in the street about to be chopped off by a logging truck. They say, "Mr. Wayfarer, did you know that your membership expires today?"

I borrowed a phrase from Chili. "You're kidding me, right?" Is it STILL good? Yeah? Then how about you get the *&@#% tow truck out here! I'll worry about where the check went when I'm not about to be run over, OK?

Then comes the fun part. Trying to communicate where I am.

"I'm on the northbound off-ramp, at the end, by the stop sign."

"OK. And which direction are you going?" (Can you tell where this is headed?)

The entire ten minute conversation went like this. Eventually, I just told her to send the truck to a nearby truckstop and I'd direct him by cell phone if he was as feebleminded as she was (I was more polite on the phone. Can you imagine the karmic debt that would come from saying that to her?). Once I was off the phone with her, I called 911. To my incredible surprise, they were aware that I was stranded and had already dispatched someone to investigate. He arrived within a minute after I had spoken with dispatch. The best part? He even called the tow company and told them to get a move on! The tow truck arrived in less than 10 minutes after that!

Now that's prompt service, people!

Wifeness and I stripped my truck of all it's personal items why it lay bleeding oil in the dealership parking lot. Now, I don't have personal attachments to my vehicles, but this process always seems a little sad to me. Sort of like moving out of an apartment, I get this small amount of melancholy, but without the anticipation of moving to a new place. When I closed the driver's side door for the last time, I could not help but pat her on the hood and say thank you for the 10 good years and 120,000 she had served so well.

My next car will not be her equal.

PS: I had the garage to a check under the hood just to determine cause of death. It was not, they said, anything that was wrong with it from before. Rather, an entirely new and undiagnosable problem was the culprit that, much like everything else that was wrong, would cost some $750 to fix.

How many $750 problems can one car have before it dies? The answer: 4.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and earth…and Legos!

Chili introduced me to Fussy’s concept of using action figures to demonstrate Ashtanga Yoga. Check it out! [HERE] They are hilarious!

Now, I would like to present to you the Holy Bible, told via Legos--[HERE]. Irishbroadsword gets the credit for sharing this with me, and kudos go out to The Rev. Brendan Powell Smith! This is what creativity in storytelling is all about! It absolutely cracked me up to read this. I nearly spewed coffee out my nose when I read his version of Genesis, chapter 4. Wonderful! What do you think?

Vanx, does this count as an individual creation of the Last Supper?

World Cup and Action Research...

They broke my heart.

It hurts me as an American that our nation did not field a competitive team for the world’s most prestigious event in the world’s most popular sport. I don’t care that they don’t win it. Frankly, I like it that most of the world is better than we are. It irritates me that we didn’t show up to play. It’s no wonder the U.S. is ridiculed by the rest of the world. We’re a superpower. We can launch rockets. We use 97% of the world’s resources. Yet, we can’t find, in a nation of nearly 300 million people, 23 who can want to play this game consistently as well as any other nation in this half of the world. Even Trinidad & Tobago, which has a population of only 34 people, have done better in Germany than we have. They came to PLAY. We came to GET OUR ASSES BEAT.

Now I’m pulling for Ghana. They came to play, and showed they’ve got the stuff. They play Brazil next. They probably won’t win, but they’ll put it all out there. That deserves some support. Go Ghana!!

__________________________


Countdown to M.Ed. -- 3 courses.

The next one is a research class. Action research. Sounds all superhero-y doesn’t it?

Action research is the kind done to directly affect current practice (in my case, teaching practice), so it’s supposed to have something to do with what I’m doing in my classroom currently. Well, not currently, since I’m essentially done teaching until September, but you get the idea.

The thing is, I’m torn. I have things relative to my current teaching I could explore, but I’ve been so thoroughly disgusted with my teaching this year that examining it objectively is going to be tough.

I’ll admit it. It’s been a tough year. Being gone the first two months of the year. Trying to make up for that lost time while still trying to figure out which way is up. Graduate school kicking back in. No Child Left Behind.

I feel like my students haven’t learned a god. damn. thing.

Worse than that is the nagging, gnawing feeling I have that I didn’t teach them anything. They went through this whole year and got nothing worthwhile from me, and when I look back at why, there is so little that I can honestly say I could have done differently. I don’t have any problem taking responsibility for my teaching, and I’ll own up to the fact that I made decisions that meant my teaching was less inspired because I had other things to do, but it happened the way it had to. I’m not happy with it, though, and I’m carrying a little resentment at having to make decisions that don’t support the part of my life that really nourishes my soul.

Maybe that’s what I should research: The effect of real world bullshit on veteran World Language teachers.

Actually, I’m debating whether I want to make the effort to research teaching practices in schools and programs that work primarily with foster/adopted children. The Landmark Community School project is investigating whether this is a viable demographic to serve, and it makes sense to get the lay of the land, to see what people are already doing and whether it’s effective. It’s a lot of work, though. I’m not sure my constitution is going to handle it. Maybe I just need some coffee.

A moment of silence, please...

My truck has just been diagnosed with a terminal “illness”. Her life’s blood is slowly leaking away. She is 15 years old, with nearly 175,000 miles, so I knew this would happen sooner or later, but I was hoping to get enough time out of her so that we might enjoy some time without a car payment (Wifeness’ van will be paid off in a few months). This vehicle has been very good to me and my family, and I will mourn its loss.

There just wasn’t any sense in putting the money into it at this point. Her body and frame is rusting out (old age is a bitch!) and, in addition to the valve seal job she would need, she’s well overdue for a new clutch, a power steering pump, new shocks and a new seal for her sunroof. All together, it just wouldn’t be worth it.

So, while she’s on her way out, the process of finding a suitable replacement begins. Callous, I know, but she’s been gracious enough to give me time so I want to put it to good use. Who knows how much longer we’ll have, after all.

Wifeness and I have talked about what qualities my “new” trusty steed should possess. Please consider the following as an example of the intrinsic differences between what we each value in a vehicle.

Wifeness

• Must have a back seat (adequate for carrying two children and car seats)
• Must be enjoyable for her to drive (she HATES driving my truck!)
• Should have airbags, antilock brakes and appropriate safety features (“You may NOT die on me!”)
• Should be cost-effective to drive and maintain (25+ mpg would be great!).
• Should not be ugly

Me

• Must be a stick-shift (How can I drive like Ayrton Senna with an automatic??)
• Must have storage adequate to transport one soccer team’s worth of equipment (or the equivalent in fast-food wrappers)
• Should have a sunroof (since I’ll never own a convertible…)
• Should be able to drive around in the snow and mud without sniveling and WITHOUT GETTING STUCK!! (I don’t go off road a lot but, when I do, I damn sure expect to be invincible!)
• Must be able to properly and easily carry a 4x8 sheet of plywood and a canoe (but not necessarily at the same time).

I put it to you, fellow bloggers!

What kind of vehicle, in your own estimation, matches these criteria the best? Do you own one? Do you like it? Your opinions and experience are, of course, muchly appreciated.

The Rewards of my Profession...

On Thursday last, I got to see a production of La Casa de Bernarda Alba, by Federico García Lorca. The production I saw was in Spanish, but the actors also presented an English version later that evening. The theatre in which they performed was small (less than 80 seats), and the set was cleverly incorporated into the entire space. The costumes were beautifully made to appear authentic to the time and location of the play (rural Spain at the turn of the last century). It was amazing!

You wanna know what was best about it?

I didn’t go out to see this production. I simply walked downstairs from my classroom to the “Shoebox Theater” and watched the end-of-semester project of my school’s Spanish for Native Speakers class.

That’s right, ladies and gentlemen. This was a class. A semester-long class, to boot. Since February, these students have been studying Lorca’s work (not just this play, but the others in the trilogy), the history, culture and politics of Spain and learning how to interpret and translate poetry and dialog between the two languages. There are only two seniors in this class, and none of the others had any on-stage experience prior to this production.

Did I make it clear that these guys are studying and performing Lorca? In high school? And not just in Spanish, but English as well! Plus, several of the students in this class were double cast (played different parts in each version of the play) for this production. This is big, people.

To give credit where it is very much due, I do not teach this class. That honor goes to Benigno Sanchez-Eppler. I work with many of the members of the cast in other ways (soccer coach, academic advisor), but two of the women (they deserve that title) in the cast were students of mine last year. Both spent time in Central America during the summer and fall (one in Guatemala, one in Mexico), and I was proud to see them move into that class when they returned to school.

It is both a blessing and a liability of teaching both French and Spanish that I do not teach upper levels of either language. I could not hope to do all the things I do and teach four separate classes in a day, and teaching introductory language classes offers me some sanity. This comes with a cost, though. I get most of my students when they are 9th and 10th graders, still in the throws of adolescence and not having a clear sense of who they are or why they’re here. They very often transfer from other schools, where they struggled academically and any real confidence in themselves as individuals. I see them in class every day, all year, when they are still getting used to being in high school. I’m in the trenches with them at the beginning, and I don’t often get to see what happens to them after they move on from my class.

It is always a special treat to see my students at their most amazing in a context that is not my class. I was moved nearly (nearly, mind you) to tears as I watched them afterward talking to the audience and members of the local press about the play, their interpretations of the language and the experience of being on stage for the first time (in their underwear!) There was an energy in that space then that was impossible to describe completely, except to say that it was positively exquisite.

That event brought to light other students I have worked with recently, and the ways they demonstrate their amazingness, and I thought I’d share with you a couple of them .

We have a jazz a cappella group at PVPA that a number of my students work with. 5-Alone makes truly beautiful music (I know this because they practice in the classroom across the hall from me in the afternoons). You can buy their CDs and check out their tour schedule at their website. (Lucia, in the front, still owes me a research paper!)

I don’t get to say that Sonya Kitchell is my student now because she withdrew from PVPA at the end of last year to pursue her career in music, but I am still very proud of her efforts for me. It took a lot of work on her part to go to school and get herself started at the same time, and I’m really excited that it’s starting to pay off. She was just on NPR, so you can hear her there. She also has a website.

Brianne, whom you have read about recently, gets props for putting the costumes together for the Bernarda Alba cast with absolutely no time. You did a great job! Now, finish your work for me and earn credit for French!

There are others. You’ll hear about them in time…

In Honor of Soldiers?

As the flowers rest on the decorated graves and the sunlight shines on the beautiful sailboats, Uncle Sam whispers in my ear about how we should care for the soldiers and remember the ones that have died. Swimming pools open, BBQs fry. Today is the day to think of what they have done for us. There are blurs of red, white and blue marching down the street and flags are lowered at half-mast. But we should always remember and never forget what set us free, from this very day on.

— Memorial Day by Ali M., 3rd Grader, Academy Elementary School, Madison, CT. © 2001. [Online] URL: http://www.usmemorialday.org/write.html


I find myself conflicted about this holiday. I have always wanted to believe in the absolute virtuousness of the sacrifice of a soldier’s life, but I’ve begun to question whether that ideal is, on its own, an appropriate thing to honor. I’m not dragging out a political soapbox here; I just want to get some thoughts out.

What are we really celebrating on this holiday? The answer we all learned in elementary school is that we should remember the soldiers who died defending and protecting our country. OK. What constitutes “defending and protecting”? Is that what our soldiers in Iraq are doing now? I know that’s what we are being fed as doctrine, but I have been offered this fruit before and have learned to distrust it. It’s that lack of trust in the worthiness of the sacrifice, I guess, that is at the root of my conflict. I’m just not sure it’s right and proper to memorialize soldiers who, for example, fight to enforce on others our ideals and causes, especially in the name of defending our country.

We’ve been told since Vietnam (and perhaps earlier, I don’t really know) that it is important to honor our soldiers for their sacrifice, even when we disagree with the cause they champion. After all, they are only doing what they’ve been told, right? Oliver Wendall Holmes wrote that, “…the faith is true and adorable which leads a soldier to throw away his life in obedience to a blindly accepted duty, in a cause which he little understands, in a plan of campaign of which he has little notion, under tactics of which he does not see the use.” Is that something worth honoring? As someone who has had his faith in his government and fellow citizens shaken and who values his experience and his intelligence, I find myself balking at this as a thing worthy of memorial.

Were soldiers today drafted or conscripted and sent off, as they were in times past, perhaps I would see this as much more black-and-white, but the truth of the matter is that they are not. Our military is composed of volunteers. Some, I’m certain, choose to serve for noble reasons; many do not and it insults me, quite frankly, to have someone tell me that a profiteer’s motives are as worthy of respect as the true patriot’s. Yet, how can I know one from the other? How can I know that the war they fight is an honorable one?

I very much value the nobility of true patriotism. I would not hesitate to give my life to defend my family (and that includes my “family-by-oath”) and my right to fulfill my destiny (and for others I love to fulfill theirs) free of oppression and tyranny. Those soldiers, volunteers or not, whose lives were taken in defense of these I gladly honor. I resent, however, the implication that I must also pay homage to those whose crusades are less principled.

Am I being hypocritical here? Quixotic? Your thoughts, as always, are appreciated.

Heard in School...

The following was overheard during lunch today at school. It was uttered in a single breath, without pause, in the space of exactly 1.34 seconds.

“Maybe I’ll shave my head. I’ll do it tomorrow. Well, not tomorrow. This weekend. I have to go a party this weekend. What was I talking about?”

You go, Brianne! You're amazing!