In an oddly-timed twist, Russcula has resurfaced.  I last heard from him in April, an unexpected two line email of hallucinogenic references to things I'd written and sent to him a year earlier, when I came back to the States.  April was the first time I'd heard from him since the previous spring.  I printed the email out, and I posted it on my ( Read more... )

This one was for a project on "what I learned about teaching and writing poetry ( Read more... )

Had to write a short memoir piece for that class on the Teaching of Writing that I think came out reasonably well.  So I thought I'd put it in here.

You make me think of cowboys.  The way your smile takes up your whole face and your eyes crinkle up and gleam hazel, gray, and green through your deep, deep tan.  I’ve never seen anyone whose eyes ( Read more... )

In a couple of weeks I have a class for my masters titled, "The Teaching of Writing, K-12."  I hear from the other people in my program it's a total waste for high school teachers, that the woman is obsessed with "the craft" of writing, and that in general, I should just go in with a very closed mind.  From what I see of the syllabus, there will be ( Read more... )

Came home today around seven, made myself dinner, and sat myself at the kitchen table for a nice evening of reading.  I borrowed For Whom the Bell Tolls recently and have been enjoying it immensely.  Hemingway is always sort of a pleasant surprise for me.  So I sat and read for a while and drank some tea.  And then I pushed myself up from the chair ( Read more... )

Most days, there's just nothing to write ( Read more... )

I have been to a Bat Mitzvah in Chicago, a three-day affair with a high temperature of 4 degrees Fahrenheit.

I have been thinking very seriously about What I Want To Do In Real Life.

I have been trying to plan my next unit for work:  Exile in Babylon.  This unit includes Ezekiel, who would likely be an institutionalized schizophrenic if he were alive ( Read more... )

I was trying to figure out exactly where I was on January 12 a year ago.  I kept it all documented in a little notebook, where I stayed every night while I was backpacking, but I lost that notebook shortly after moving to Boston.  In any case, I figured it out, I think.  I was on the ferry across the straights that separate the North and South ( Read more... )

Tonight I ate free Chinese food at the Harvard Chabad House.  Chabad is an organization of very religiously observant Jews who establish bases all around the world offering free kosher food and Jewish activities to people, mostly Israelis and students, who want the occasional Passover seder or (more often) free meal.   They're a sneaky kind of ( Read more... )

I'm writing from Hershey this evening, because, as some of you know, I've come back to Pennsylvania for my week off work.   This week came not a moment too soon; my two hints that it was time to for a break came quickly and without mercy.  First, I pulled a chair out from under a student (accidentally).  The poor girl thought she was sitting in a ( Read more... )