T-Dawg’s Blog

Slice of Life Story Challenge: Day #31

I’ve always wanted to be a writer. At “Career Day” in 3rd grade, my best friend, Ginger, and I stood up and declared that I would write the books and she would illustrate them. We were convinced that our future was in the bag.

I didn’t waver and went on to major in creative writing in college.  Years (and a lot of fun) later, I landed a job as a photojournalist. The pay was so horrible that I had to work nights in a fancy restaurant to support my writing habit. Then ten more years passed and I started thinking I should go for my masters degree and  get a “real” job, so I became an English teacher and my own writing was relegated to weekend journaling when I bothered to make the time for it.

This past month of writing “Slices” has made me feel like a writer again. It has given the month of March (which I usually hate!) a purpose, and I have spent many a day pondering what “slice” would eventually materialize. I have turned my introspection toward writing and made it less about lamenting the cold and ice. And somehow, during that time, all the snow melted and the sun came out. And I made some new connections…

Thank you, TwoWritingTeachers, for helping me navigate the transition from winter to spring. Thank you to all of the writers who put their thoughts and comments out there every day in March. I am sorry to see it end. I am proud that I did it. And I am humbled by the community of writers who accompanied me on this beautiful journey.

Peace out, T-Dawg

Slice of Life Story Challenge: Day #30

     I can’t really “slice” about what’s on my mind right now. Even though it has all those juicy elements — poignancy, melancholy, bittersweetness, and hope — it’s just too private to go into in this way. So, I’ll just say that on the drive home I noticed how the birches in March are so much whiter than they are any other time of the year. And that I love what I love, just like the poet Mary Oliver said I should. The door will always be open. That’s what I heard. That’s what I’ll remember…

Slice of Life Story Challenge: Day #29

My oldest nephew had a significant birthday today. (Happy Birthday, B! ) I was young when he was born, so while he grew up we were friends more than auntie/nephew. When he was 12, he came to visit me up in Oregon. It was an amazing week that we said we would never forget.

 
Now he’s a great Dad, husband, worker, and nephew. We don’t stay in touch as much as I thought we were going to  – he’s in California and I’m in New England.  And when we do talk, it’s catching up stuff and news about the family. I used to feel so close to him and now he is a nice man I know.
I want to ask him if he remembers riding on the back of my motorcycle down the streets of Eugene. Does it at all resonate how much he loved the land up there, the freedom? And what about the times we drove to the river in my truck? He was a fun kid and I was his wild Auntie. I never saw our changes coming.
Happy Birthday, B. I miss you. 
 

Slice of Life Story Challenge: Day #28

This photo says it all. The juxtaposition/oxymoron of March in New England. An invitation to perhaps, hope.

We sat outside all afternoon at a picnic bench in front of a restaurant and talked in the sun. Some people were yelling at each other from across the street. At one table, five friends talked to their far-away buddy via speaker phone. I needed only one layer of shirt and my sunglasses; the sun was diffused yet still warm.

At home, during the UConn -vs- Miss game, all the windows were open and I could hear the kids across the street screaming from their trampoline. My dogs went in and out at will. Tiger Woods sank a long putt and then embedded his drive into a mound of mud. UConn won.

This is the easiest day.

Slice of Life Story Challenge: Day #27

The New England Writing Project conference is in town this weekend and I just got home from meeting with some old and new friends. I’m Friday-night-exhausted, but also kind of excited. Meeting with the tech folks tonight really charged me up! (Shout out to Kevin and Bonnie,  two fellow “Slicer” comrades who were also there.)

I’m new to tech and I have so much to learn, but my “beginners mind” goes into high gear when I get around those in the know. I love listening to their conversations and trying to figure out what the heck they are talking about. Tweet this and Twitter that. Social networking, platforms, AVI, and Audacity. It’s all a foreign language I’m yearning to learn. And it’s really nice to be the student again, asking questions and watching demonstrations, straining every remaining cell that’s left in my little pea-brain to comprehend this enigmatic new mode of communication.

And it is…communication. Tomorrow we are presenting an idea that will help writers stay in a response community throughout the year. And as we discussed it, I realized how it reminds me of this whole Slice of Life community, and how much I will miss it now that it is almost over. Audience really means a lot, and supportive comments can change the energy of one’s day. It’s been an amazing and gratifying activity to write for and respond to a community of people I don’t even know. And it never would have happened in quite this way without the technology.

Slice of Life Story Challenge: Day #26

Me and the gym? We have a dysfunctional relationship. It’s one of those things where we get back together with total optimism and then make the same mistakes we always made before. We break up and we reunite. We promise things will be different this time and they aren’t. We think about couples therapy and refuse to go. We have affairs — me with the local pub, the gym with other more fit and strong-willed athletes. We yearn, we stumble, we try again, and we never learn…

It was a really cold, dark, icy winter in New England, and I became a permanent fixture on my soft, green couch. With HD television and a DVR, I loved my sedentary life under the blanket next to the sleeping dogs. Then one day I realized I was a slug, so I called up my old flame — the gym.

I showed up with flowers. The treadmill beckoned. I bounced up and down on the elliptical trainer until my hip sockets ached. The relationship was back on again.  I pushed weights up the nautilus tracks while listening to The Red Hot Chili Peppers, and  I visited my gym-lover three times a week for two whole weeks.

And then I stopped going – just like I always do. I walked away without an explanation, and I didn’t even want to talk about it. I found every excuse to avoid going. My gym intimacy issues reared their ugly little head. I just couldn’t make a commitment.

I slunk back today, whipped my card through the ID scanner, and waved at the people behind the front desk who didn’t recognize me. Back in the cardio room, my bewildered muscles tried to forgive me as I pushed them through a routine they had already forgotten. Salty sweat burnt my eyes as I pushed harder and harder, trying to show the gym I really do still care. Then I collapsed in the sauna and planned my escape. Now I don’t have to come back for three more days, I calculated. I love you. I’m here for you. Not.

Slice of Life Story Challenge: #25

I got pulled over by a cop tonight for the first time in eight years. The blue lights were flashing and my heart was doing flips. He told me I was going 80 in a 60 zone. I told him I was a tired high school teacher who had experienced a long and tough day. He asked me where I teach, and then he went back to his car with all my information and was gone for a long time. I fantasized about the price of my insurance for the next six years. He came back and said, “Ms. ________, I’m going to only give you a verbal warning tonight, but I want you to know this would have been a $200 ticket.” I meekly said thank you, and then I sped home. Phew!

Slice of Life Story Challenge: Day #24

I have a student teacher in my classroom, and I think she’s awesome. Young, smart, driven, curious, and fun — she’ll make a great teacher some day. Right now, though, she’s VERY tired and stressed out, so she doesn’t believe me when I tell her it will get easier. Does it get easier?

Having a student teacher really puts me in touch with my profession, and it reminds me how hard it is to do what we do on a daily basis. Today I said to her, “Now you understand why we get so angry when people point out that we have it easy — we get summers off.” She scowled in agreement.

Scrambling to come to terms with long-term planning, grading, and leading discussions that don’t bore the students, she has a lot on her mind. There’s also college, a thesis, impending graduation, the future job market, and a non-existent social life to occupy her thoughts. I want to just grab her and put her in a chaise-lounge chair by a pool in Palm Springs.

After she left today, I sat around the table with a pal and we laughed about our own insane days of student teaching. We had several jobs, crazy/sexy lovers, long blocks to fill with no arsenal of lesson plans, and graduate classes to complete. (Ahhh, it makes me tired to even remember it.) I also had a great cooperating teacher who believed in me. I hope I can be that for her…

Slice of Life Story Challenge: Day #23

They watch me from the window when I first get home, and if I back my car into the driveway that means “WALKIE!” time. The craziness begins. Barking. Whining. Snorting. Howling. And off we go.

We went on the forest walk today for the first time since last November. The ride there was deafening — the old girl yodeled and her younger sister screamed out the window at every dog we passed. Pedestrians looked alarmed at first, then stopped to smile at the brown dog heads that protruded from both of my back windows.

I thought the ice would be gone, but today’s frigid weather kept the path hard and slippery. The old girl and I negotiated the frozen ground like drunken toddlers; the younger sister ran impatiently ahead. They were so happy! Once we hit some solid ground, they cut loose and snarfed up every animal smell that was left over from last winter. Their cold, wet noses unearthed rotten leaves, deer scat, and other things I didn’t want to know about. They ate snow and sticks and drank from a vernal pool.

Now they’re downstairs by the woodstove and I don’t feel guilty anymore. I got them out –enabled them to be the sporting dogs they are. I gave them pure joy and it made my day.

Slice of Life Story Challenge: Day #22

Sunday Roadtrip to Vermont: 3.22.09

When I was a kid, Sunday was my least favorite day of the week. My contentious family would attempt to spend time together, but it never added up to much fun, and I was usually relieved to fall into bed after The Wonderful World of Disney and look forward to Monday morning.

It started off with church, which I hated. My mother forced this raging tom-boy into a ruffly dress with petticoats and black patent-leather shoes that she called “flats.” It was torture. I had to sit next to her in the pew, trying not to laugh when my goofy sister would intentionally warble the hymns. “Shhh!” my mother would hiss, and her fingers would lock into a pinch position that I knew was coming if I didn’t stifle the giggles. I never understood the sermon and I couldn’t wait to get outside into the sun and air. The church was often stuffy and smelled like old people, bad perfume, and a rotting Easter lily.

The day would continue to get worse as my disconnected family ventured out on a “drive” for the day. Windows rolled up and air conditioner blasting, my Pop slowly exhaled his cigarette smoke into the yellow Ford Galaxy we were trapped in. Sandwiched between my two older sisters in the backseat, I fought off my impending carsickness until we arrived, oh goody, at the cemetery.

Before we could put the flowers on my grandmother’s grave, my mother had us meticulously trim the edges of the grass around the headstone with little cuticle scissors. Then we had to schlep these heavy tins of putrid water down to the fountain to refill them with fresher water. I didn’t know my grandmother — she died before I was born — so it was hard to manifest true sadness at this memorial to her life. My stupid dress itched my legs and all I wanted was to run away from the rest of my family and play with the ducks in the Forest Lawn pond.

Our day would end at a restaurant called Buddy’s, where they served barbecued ribs. We always wanted cokes but my mother insisted on milk. Sometimes we split a piece of lemon meringue pie. Mostly we sat in silence because the cemetery visit depressed my mom and everyone was too afraid to speak and set her off. Then we drove home and went our separate ways inside the house.

Now I love Sundays. I sleep in, go on road-trips of my own, eat what I want, and avoid churches and cemeteries at all costs. I have no nostalgia for the Sunday’s I grew up with. I’m glad they’re way, way gone.