G.I. Joe

“So today they’re suggesting that I might make a good Asymmetric Warfare/Land Warrior Military Analyst,” I say to my husband yesterday morning.

“That’s our ad,” my husband said. “We need one in our building.”

Prior to last week’s securing of desirable employ, I’d been loosely pursuing career options in popular online forums, which basically amounted to reading listings my husband sent my way, and answering a questionnaire about my career interests.

Do you want a job that requires creativity? Absolutely!

Do you want to work indoors or outside? I’ll do my work outside, thank you.

Do you like routine tasks, or do you prefer challenges? Doing things the same way twice really bores me.

Based, evidently on my questionnaire answers with no regard to the information provided on my attached resume, I receive periodic suggestions via email. If the customized recommendations are a viable indicator, I might have had a bright future as an OB GYN, a cake decorator, a night supervisor, or, impressively, an Asymmetric Warfare/Land Warrior Military Analyst.

“Am I well suited for this position?” I asked my husband.

“No. Not at all,” he responded, a little too quickly for my liking.

“Why not?” I demanded. “What do these people do?”

“They decide what sort of weapons are appropriate in specific warfare situations,” he responded.

“Well, there’s always guns and clubs,” I said.

“Mmmm…see, that’s why you wouldn’t be good at this,” my husband responded with authority.

“Well, I don’t like war anyway,” I said, ready to dismiss the position out of hand, before my own words rendered me suddenly inspired. “Wait! I know exactly what to send,” I triumphed. “A box of joe and a couple dozen donuts! There’s nothing that can’t be solved over coffee. ”

“If coffee and donuts could solve a war, I’d be out of a job,” my husband said, heading for the door.

It was then that I realized that I’d likely be an outstanding Asymmetric Warfare/Land Warrior Military Analyst and my husband knew it and was running scared.

“I’ll bet you were just a minimal match,” he grumbled, referencing the system the referring firm uses to rate the level of compatibility between the job and the seeker.

This was true, but I had an air-tight workaround.

“They say I’m as qualified to analyze asymmetric warfare as I am to teach English,” I responded, because it was also true. They did. “And I have a master’s degree in that.”

So it’s a good thing that I’m already under contract because it’s clear that my husband wasn’t going to put in a good word for me. It’s also clear that, being the superior candidate that I evidently am, I’d have easily landed the job, putting me in the awkward position of being in constant inter-office combat with my own spouse. And I wouldn’t have stood a chance in that battle—my husband hates coffee.

Summing it Up

A post detailing everything I know about math would be a very brief read. Like most who can boast a post-5th grade education, I’m pretty comfortable with the Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally acronym by which we recall the proper order of mathematical operations. I’ve memorized the oft-recited and apparently key formula, y=mx+b, although I wouldn’t know how to practically apply this knowledge if my life depended on it. And we would be nearing the end of this post if I did not also know that an equation requires harmony on both sides before it is balanced.

I’ve acknowledged several times on this blog my realization that I need both teaching and writing in my life to feel professionally complete. I’ve noted my hopes to resolve the teaching side of my professional equation with a part time gig as an art teacher. I am pleased to say that the happy conclusion to last week’s interview posts is that I have landed the ideal art teaching job. I will be teaching pre-K-5th graders two days a week in a totally outfitted art room, complete with storage room, sink, and supplies, a conclusion that happily resolves one side of my employment equation.

But, as previously noted, a half calculation does not a solution make. Even in aftermath of factoring in the exponential work load that goes along with being an August hire, my thoughts return in a repeating pattern to the unresolved side of my equation. Mathematically speaking, balance will only result from achieving an equally positive result in my writing endeavors, and I find myself divided on where to best focus my efforts. Continue my YA series? Return to reporting? Explore new markets? The possibilities are infinite, but I can’t assume the results will be equivalent.

So the computation must continue. Fortunately, I think I can figure this one out without protractors, graph paper, or a calculator, although I suspect I may still be tapping my pencil in frustration until I can scratch out a viable product.

A Great Migration, Indeed

“It’s like the great migration,” my daughter observed in the wake of my inquiries concerning a detected lack of enthusiasm as we packed for our annual camping trip to our favorite state park.

“But so much of your childhood has happened there,” I insisted.

“Soooo…much,” my daughter heartily agreed.

Last week marks thirteen years of setting up camp at the same spot. Summer just wouldn’t be summer without some days unfolding on the shores of Lake Douthat in Campground A.

I’ve always wanted us to be one of those families that heads to The Cabin every summer. In books, these leisure-loving souls while away entire months in rustic-yet-snug bungalows, allowing sea breezes to restore their spirits while engaging in all manner of creative and recreational activities. In real life, I do, from time to time, hear tell of folks running off to The Lake or The Beach House for several days, or perhaps a weekend here or there, but never like in the books.

This week, I came to realize that it’s unlikely that Real People actually summer at The Cabin these days, and after over a dozen years, I guess we can count ourselves among those who make routine lakeward pilgrimages.

And who really needs the confining walls and upkeep of a Cabin anyway, when you can make the whole outdoors your home?

And so we settled in, each of us with our own set of priorities. My husband wanted to read, while my son purchased fishing gear in hopes he might catch, gut, and fry “fish that he eats, like tuna and salmon” —right out of the freshwater, man made lake. Even my daughter got into the spirit of things, especially when we agreed to take her into “town” (a McDonalds and a Verizon store situated next to a K-Mart) to catch some cellular service for a few minutes every afternoon.

And me? I just planned to suck the marrow right out of the entire experience. I packed an entire library, but focused on the sort of activities that require one to sign waivers, such as whitewater kayaking, nighttime owl prowls, and cookery over open flame--an event in which the entire family participated and actually signed releases acknowledging the “inherent dangers” associated with campfire cooking.


But the most dangerous activity we undertook was a photo shoot on a rickety bridge, which involved no forms at all.


Fortunately, the only resulting damage occurred when I dropped my phone from the car and my husband ran over it, a situation that, according to my friend Sam, has all the makings of a country song.


And I actually did sustain a rather deep cut on the kayaking trip. Turns out that going barefoot in the river is a bad idea. Who knew?



I limited the rest of my swimming adventures to the controlled setting of the park beach, which was completely uneventful save for the discovery that I evidently have not completely recovered from academia. When my husband handed me our swimming passes, my heart leaped with excitement as I thumbed through the cards and saw they were all A’s.


The week was filled with moments that probably only matter to us, but I hope that the few I’ve shared have jogged some memories of your own. I suspect that everyone has a place or two that functions as a second home—a Real Life equivalent to summering at The Cabin. Because we all need places where, at once, we can let our imagination run wild and dream big dreams, yet think clearly enough to see the big picture. Places that are comfortable, yet engaging. Places that give us the energy, courage and strength to return to Real Life. Places—whether they’re in the back yard, across town, or cross country—at which we love to arrive and hate to leave.

Personally, I’ve never left my Cabinless Lakeside Abode without a few tears. When it was time to leave this time, my husband gave me a hug and said, “It’ll be OK.”

“When?” I asked, not quite buying it.

My husband gave a little laugh. “Probably next year about this time,” he answered, pulling me a little closer.

I’m looking toward the next Great Migration already.

Reimagining

Reimagining…isn’t that a great word?

It’s a word full of hope, and promise, and redemption. It’s a word that assures us that just because we imagined something one way, doesn’t mean the dream can’t be retooled if things don’t go as planned.

It’s a word that comes up a lot in Ordinary Radicals by Shane Claiborne—they only book currently on my corner shelf--and I’ve adopted it. I love it. In his book, Shane talks about reimagining lots of things—abandoned houses that become living space for the homeless; careers after realizing that life is about more than amassing as much as you can for yourself, and entire philosophies about how to spend our time while were here on the planet.

I’ve been away all week, at one of my favorite places in the mountains and I’m as sure as I can be as I look into my pre-departure crystal ball ( I wrote this week’s posts ahead of time) that I’ll be doing some reimagining of my own.

As I shared earlier this week, I have a really good chance of getting a job that I would love. As I’ve mentioned several times on this blog, and dozens more, live, to friends and family, all I really wanted to do after completing my masters degree was to go back to what I was doing before—because I was really happy teaching art part time and freelancing on my off days. Of course, with an advanced degree, I’d love higher pay and better gigs, but in general, I like my work and I really don’t want to do anything else.

But there’s this other part of me that has been seeking change. The part of me that feels stuck in a rut, the part that wants to be, see, and do everything.

For a long time, I thought change would come in the form of a move. All winter I told people that we were moving this summer. Because I really thought we were. But the move never materialized. Then I pretty much expected that change would come in the form of a different kind of job, because I didn’t think I’d be fortunate enough to find a situation anything like I had before, so I adopted an adventure mindset about where I might find work.

So I’m also wondering if it IS a fortunate thing to wind up back where I started when there are so many roads left unexplored. I’m wondering what the next steps will be for my writing, as my career has been punctuated by so many dead ends.

When I was in Africa in 2000, I was fascinated to see children playing with beautiful model cars—that they constructed from trash. The image has always stayed with me as a reminder that even refuse can be fashioned into something functional, innovative, interesting, and enjoyable.

So while I’m out on the lake in my kayak, retracing familiar woodland paths, and relaxing around the campfire, I’ll also be I’m reimagining the possibilities of coming full circle, of blank canvasses and new beginnings. I‘ll be reimagining spaces and places in an environment where I always seem to have the best visibility.

I hope you have some things to re-imagine, too, and that you have a place that’s quiet and beautiful in which to dream. I’d love reading about it if you’d like to share. Meet me here on Monday and we’ll chat.

Second Interview

Spoiler alert! This post contains graphic depictions of sweat. I am obligated to state this at the outset, as my husband hates blogs about sweat.

So the forces of The Big Three failed to thwart my first interview. I forgot they had reinforcements.

I got a second interview, and, buoyed by my apparent invincibility earlier in the week, I was perhaps overly optimistic, I realized, as the comfortable window my way-too-early departure time afforded was dwindled to near panic status after a series of unexpected construction delays. This was particularly troublesome, as another well known nemesis had me frantically scanning the horizon for minute marts.

Last summer, there was a little false alarm here at RWL when I mistakenly thought I invented sweat shields. A particularly violet outbreak at an event caused me to retreat into a rest room and fashion a keep-dry solution with some free maxi pads. Although saddened when internet research revealed that my idea wasn’t novel--indeed the market is flooded with such absorbency products--I decided that my homemade model was more economical (although I now purchase the pads, rather than rely on rest room freebies).

Unfortunately, I decided that my new interview shirt was dark enough to go sans absorbency, which I discovered enroute was faulty assumption. It became clear, however, as construction site dissolved into construction site that I wouldn’t have time to make the purchase even if a store materialized. Frantic, I looked around the car for back up. All I had on hand was a ball cap, which I stuffed under my left pit, and a cloth coffee cozy, which I slid under my right arm. I figured this stop gap measure would at least keep the water damage from expanding.

I pulled into the packing lot with a minute to spare, remembered to pull the cap and cozy from my shirt, tossed both on the seat, clamped my upper arms tight against my torso and plunged in. My seemingly limited range of motion in the upper body did not generate inquiry. The interview went at least as well as the previous one.

This is so meant to be.

Interview

Some things are just meant to be. Glancing at the sidewalk for no reason and finding that earring you lost six months ago, being home unusually early and getting an unexpected call from an old friend, discovering that forgotten pint of coffee ice cream in the back of the freezer at the end of a long day.

Me, getting the job for which I just interviewed.

The reason for my absolute confidence in this fact has nothing to do with how perfectly my qualifications match the job description (although they do, to a “t”) or the compatibility of the hours (fits my schedule like a glove) or the desirability of the work (very), and everything to do with the sudden impotence of the Big Three. You might know them as shoes, coffee, and chocolate—I’m more familiar with them as The reasons I’m Not More Successful.

I don’t think I’ve ever had specific occasion to mention my footwear concerns, but I have them in spades. No matter how many pairs of shoes I acquire, it seems I never have the pair I need; in fact, six or eight pairs of ill-fitting and awkwardly colored shoes in my collection serve no other purpose than to provide the illusion that I could, if pressed, become properly shod. In reality, I never have shoes in the right color, texture, or quantity for the occasion. For instance, I briefly considered wearing navy to the interview (as my favorite professor suggested was appropriate), but I own no shoes that allowed me to seriously entertain the option. So I went off the map and selected a multicolored skirt with a black base and a handful of flats that I tossed in the car.

I was to go to the interview immediately after returning to town from the early morning camp at which I’d been working, facilitating activities like pimping up flip-flops and tie-dying shirts. My plan was to change into interview clothes upon my return to the church parking lot from which we left that morning. I wasn’t until my toe ring caught the hem of my skirt that I realized that I’d brought none of the flats in with me, and that I was still wearing my camp creations. Of course, the hem held, because as I’ve already mentioned, I can’t mess this thing up. I had a good laugh at my reflection, sporting the skirt-and-flips look, and headed back to my car.

Surprised to see that I was running early, I decided that a pick-me-up was in order, considering that I’d been up since sunrise and was beginning to drag. Spotting a Starbucks on the horizon, my car instinctively turned, even as red flags began to wave madly in the periphery of my mind’s eye. I can’t begin to count the days of my life that that have gone off course at the sloshing of a wayward cup of joe, not to mention the equal foibles that have ensued from the taking of unplanned detours.

Ignoring my mental alert system, I headed into the shop. Flip. Flop. Flip. Flop. Ooops! Not good. I actually made it out in public wearing the fuzzy flips. Undaunted, I bought coffee—a big one. It sloshed. But not beyond the rim. I went back into the car and changed my shoes. I turned out of the parking lot—the wrong way. Ah ha! This is where things go wrong! I said to myself, almost in relief to be back on a normal script. However, I quickly and uneventfully corrected the error and found myself in the parking lot with ten minutes to spare.

I reached into my over-sized bag to double check my folder of important documents. All there. Check. For reasons unknown, I made a detour into a side compartment and—remember what I said about detours? –my hand came up slathered in melted chocolate. Regular Readers already know my position on chocolate in the car. Here, here, is where disaster hits, I acknowledged, stone faced. But there was a tube of wet wipes right within my grasp, and I inexplicably managed to erase all trace of the melted mess. I arrived at the front desk five minutes ahead of schedule, stain free in a cute skirt with matching pumps.

This is so meant to be.

Pickled Peppers and Sea Shells for the Road

I’m leaving town to go camping for a week, so I’ve spent today doing the Really Important Things that need to be done before we can pull out. You know, things like pickling peppers and redecorating the living room. And, oh yeah, laundry and packing.

See, I surveyed my garden yesterday and determined that the laden plants engulfed in weeds just won’t freeze frame until next week when I can deal with them. Dealing with several dozen peppers meant a three hour marathon of chopping, brining, and canning, sandwiched between some dicing and chopping on my husband’s part as he transformed a pile of tomatoes into his one-of-a-kind salsa.

On top of all that, I couldn’t dream of hitting the road without getting my living room decorated for summer. Yes, I know it’s August first, but May just wasn’t a good month for decorating, what with a masters degree to finish up and all, and June wasn’t much better. July somehow managed to squeak by, and with my front door still sporting a wreath with a pastel bunny. There may have also been a prominently displayed photo of my children framed in what looked suspiciously like an Easter basket, and there’s a chance that yellow orb I found on an out of the way shelf may have been a colored egg, but I’d like to give myself the benefit of the doubt.
So it was as clear as the glass carrot candles that turned up on my mantle that we simply can not leave until the summer stuff is up. Because if it’s not done now, it never will be. I mean, you can get away with hanging summer decorations on August first, but the eighth is simply out of the question.

So it’s nearly midnight, and most of the camping gear is in the car. Well, not the cooler, because we really don’t have our menu together, and not the clothes, because some of them aren’t washed yet. And not really the bedding, either, because that’s in the attic. But we’re good to go, mostly, because I’ve got my wooden fish hanging over the doorway, and seashells on my shelves. And if we get hungry this week, there’s always peppers.

A note about this week’s posts: I’ll be posting Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, this week. Guaranteed. (Hint: thanks to the miracles of modern technology, the posts are all queued up and ready to go. You won’t miss me a bit, unless, of course, you comment and come back looking for a response . I likely will not see your comments—the flood of them, I’m sure—until I’m home on Saturday, but will look forward to reading them then. I also won’t be adding those nice links on facebook this week, so you’ll have to remember to stop by all on your own :)).

Disqualfied

“It’ll be the first day I’ve had all to myself in at least two years,” I enthused. “Really. At least two years.” Just before bed last night I realized that with my son at a sleepover and my daughter working all day at her new job as a baker, I’d have the house to myself, and no commitments.

“I’ve got a project if you need something to do,” my husband replied nervously.

“A project? Who says I need a project? I’ve got all kinds of things to do. I’ve got some blogging, and some gardening. When I get hungry, I’ve even got a free sandwich,” I said waving aloft a coupon I’d received in a mass distribution at Vacation Bible School earlier in the evening. “It’ll be great!”

Straight out of the box, however, the day took an immediate southward turn when I opened my contact case and discovered that half of them had vanished overnight. I haven’t been to the optometrist in over two years—ironically near the time of my last free day, optometry records would later show. I figure they’ve got the lenses programmed to dissolve when you’ve been AWOL too long from regular eye care, because we’ve got nothing on the whereabouts of the stray lens.

I couldn’t get an appointment soon enough to avoid the headache that always accompanies the wearing of my glasses. From the headache, my mood dissolved into despair over what would later prove to be some unfounded worries I developed over the General State of Things. It was way too hot for gardening. I kicked around on facebook, posting cryptic and decidedly grim comments until I decided it was Free Sandwich time. My spirits could not withstand the disappointing news I received via text message enroute that a planned trip to see some local stray kittens had to be canceled due to the uncertain whereabouts of said kittens. The traffic surrounding the Free Sandwich was practically impenetrable. I took the Sandwich to go, and went right back home to surveyed my sorry state.


My daughter soon came home, took one look at me and gasped, “Oh, no, you’ve been alone all day!”

“It’s that obvious? “

Evidently, my family knows me pretty well, and the consensus is that I "don’t do well” when I’m left alone to my own resources for too long, say, for more than six hours.

Ironically, I was recently recruited as a possible candidate for an online instructor position, and invited to participate in an online conference about the position this afternoon. Although my resume may indicate that I’m a good candidate, but my family doesn’t seem to think I’m qualified.

Let's Talk

Have you ever wondered what would happen if you hosted a gathering in your home—let’s, for the sake of discussion, assume it to be an eclectic mix of family, friends, acquaintances, and any number of complete strangers—and despite your best efforts to facilitate engaging conversation the entire assemblage sat inexplicably mute?

Or wouldn’t it just be completely freaky to know-- not unlike that family from Pennsylvania with the guy living in the attic around the holidays-- that you had guests, but never actually make contact with your covert visitors?

Blogging feels a little bit like both scenarios at times. Simply put, comments make my day. There’s nothing quite like coming back to the computer a few hours after a post and discovering that something I wrote made someone, somewhere laugh, or think, or reflect. I’m told that there are bloggers out there who just can’t handle the volume of responses to their posts, either practically, or in some cases even technologically, as the flood of commentary overflows inboxes and clogs servers. I can’t imagine having problems of such magnitude. I’m just a girl trying to host a cozy online space where we can sit back and laugh; maybe kick off our flip-flops and take life a little less seriously for a few minutes. A place where levity might dissolve into perspective, and from perspective, who knows?

So pull up a monitor, grab a coffee, or diet cola, or a sip from a nearby water fountain, if that’s all you’ve got, and let’s talk. If my recent posting history is any indicator, I’ll be in and out a few times each week. And as for you, just come when you can. I’ll be glad for your company whenever you can stop by.

And if it happens to be a quiet, just listening day, that’s OK. But maybe next visit you’ll have something to add to the conversation that will make this virtual space seem a little more like home—and that’s even better.

a note about today's illustration: I fully acknowledge that today's go-along-with the post photo in no way enhances or illuminates the subject matter at hand. I have, however, decided for the time being to make this controversial image the official default photo for blogs that would otherwise go unillustrated.

Mocha Monday: Madcap Mayhem and a Bloggy Backlash

“At most, it’s a misdemeanor. We wouldn’t get more than thirty days,” my son laughed, sucking down the remaining centimeter of his free iced mocha from a Popular Burger Establishment. “Besides, it would make a great post.”

We’d just calculated that it would take roughly four of the short, squat samples to equal a standard small. From there, it was a mental hop, skip, and a jump for my son to calculate that our pre-determined errand route would take us past an equal number of the same drink-distributing establishment. He shot me a look that basically confirmed my status as the coolest mom in the world if we could stop for a quick (free) sip at all four Establishments.

I wondered aloud if there were social or legal mores which would be violated by such a romp. My son gave the thirty days tops estimate, which we laughed off as improbable and commenced on some carefree summer hi-jinks.

“So, how do we get in on this Mocha Monday?” I found myself saying moments later, in the lobby of Similar Establishment #2.

“Iced or nonfat?” a jovial barista queried, already reaching for the sample sized cups.

We slurped our samples en route to the site of our java junket. The sugar rush kicked in before we hit our next site: what fun! This, my son assured me, is what summer’s all about.

Unfortunately, the good folks at site #3 had opted out of the free caffeine campaign, which we completely respect. We waved our thanks and headed back to our vehicle, where I documented my son’s gesture of mock disappointment.

That’s when Mocha Monday took on a dark, biting edge.

A rather burly and decidedly angry manager approached my vehicle. Wow, I thought, that was quick. Some sort of McLert must have been issued. Burry images must have been distributed of us wiping the foam from Mocha one off our mouths as we sauntered in for our second round; still frames, possibly sound bites of my clever little, “How do we get in on this Mocha Monday” line. How long, exactly, is thirty days anyway? Would my boy make it out of juvie hall in time to start school?

I was prepared for just about anything to come from the manager’s lips. Anything but the booming question that actually met my ears. “Are you taking pictures of the property? Because you can’t be taking pictures of the property.”

“Ummm…I’m taking pictures of my son,” I responded. “And I absolutely can take pictures here,” I surprised myself by adding.

“No you can’t,” he insisted.

“Actually, I’ve studied the law, and I really can.”

At this point, things threatened to dissolve into a schoolyard battle of no-you-can’ts, yes-I-can’s, and the images were, after all, safely on my compact flash card, on my person, in my getaway car, so I didn’t press the issue. But I’m glad that this time, I spoke up. Because I spent a lot of time last summer feeling like a criminal for walking around with a camera, and putting up with a lot of harassment and general ill will and poor treatment: I was bounced from shops on site, snarled at for having a camera on my person in commerce sectors of tourist towns, and subsequently opted not to support the local economy by purchasing anything from these watchdog vendors.

Readers, discrimination against the innocent, camera-toting public is now an epidemic, and, in light of the number of photography-enhanced blog posts I read every day documenting the normal comings and goings of average citizens, bloggers must be prepared to defend themselves against the hysteria associated with the common camera.

I have printed off copies of the flyer The Photographer’s Right, by attorney Bert P. Krages II outlining my rights as a photographer and American citizen. The flyer will now be a permanent part of my camera gear. I have also educated myself further on the issue through reading The Legal Rights of Photographers, a document by photographer, reporter, and concerned citizen Andrew Kantor. I don’t intend to use the information to create further dissension between the camera and anti-camera factions—we photographers apparently have enough venomous sentiment coming our way anyway—but I do want to be armed with the facts I need to exercise my rights as an artist and an American.


Here’s the contested image—I’m publishing it here, because I can. The law says it’s mine.


Mocha Monday back on track, my son and I headed to location four, where we were promptly served. Iced brew, for the record. Do we have photographic evidence? You bet. And you know why?

Because the restaurant was ironically outfitted with an in-store, pre-fabbed photo op. We narrowly missed having to wait in line for our chance to snap our commemorative shot.

A (JC ) Penny for My Thoughts?

I may live in one of the top 40 metropolitan area in the country, but as a girl with a few crisp 20s burning a hole in her pocket, I’d rank my environs somewhere near compost level.

I recently received some bonus spending money as a graduation gift from my parents, and I’d love to spend a nice afternoon comparison shopping, ducking in trendy boutiques, and snagging a few great bargains. In my wildest dreams, I’d even pause to regroup with a fresh brew from a local beanery, but Regular Readers already know why that’s a pipe dream.

Simply put, we have no stores. Perhaps “no” is a bit harsh—we currently have an under stocked and overpriced Macy’s, inconveniently located in the nucleus of a ring of construction. We have a Target, but I’m sad to report that it has been reduced to a ghost town in recent weeks as the store braces for a move. In the interest of full disclosure, I will admit to having a Wal Mart, but I haven’t voluntarily entered the not-so-super center in the past decade.

What we do have is a relatively new and reasonably well-maintained JC Penny. I have lots of things from JC Penny. You could, quite possibly, go through my wardrobe and see the history of the JC Penny catalog unfold, not unlike the rings on a felled tree. Capris from the summer ’07 collection. Jeans from winter ’08. Tops from late spring. And so on.

It’s not that I don’t appreciate JC Penny; rather the contrary, actually. They have frequent sales, some of which come in the form of a complete surprise when the total at the register comes up shy of the anticipated damage. And they’re good about sending a steady stream of coupons. So I’m not complaining when I say that I’d like a little variety. After all, it’s not reasonable to expect one store to meet my every fashion whim, let alone some of my non-clothing needs, such as specialty art supplies, which can’t be procured in this town, either, ever since the sudden shuttering of our one lone arts and crafts store.

Now, I don’t doubt for a moment that our plummeting economy has a lot to do with the sad state of commerce in our city. I also don’t doubt the influence of some poor urban development in the mix, either. I trace the trouble back to the razing of our mall back in ’06. I’m the first to admit that the archaic structure needed a complete do-over, however , the implementation of the project mirrors another great Virginia scandal, aka Jim Gilmore’s late-nineties elimination of the car tax. Again, a good idea mismanaged beyond recognition. Turns out you can’t take millions of dollars out of a state’s operating budget without some consequences—it just would have been nice if the consequences had been anticipated. Instead, institutions across the state turned up suddenly poor: museums operated on slim and erratic schedules, libraries were hobbled, and free moonlight canoe rides at our favorite state park now came with a cost-prohibitive price tag of $40.00 for our family of four.

Well, it also turns out you can’t level a city’s primary shopping center without fostering a general since of disillusionment, particularly when near-completion of the new Really Big Deal Shopping Center approaches without much to show. The past months have seen some notable developments—the rubble around the Macy’s has been largely contained, the Barnes and Noble returned…and now (drum roll) Target has moved 500 yards across the road, and a full six days ahead of the grand opening date stamped on a recent circular.

All this may sound like progress. until you rewind 3 years and realize that back then we had a (less than 5 year old) Barnes and Nobel. And a Target. And a JC Penny. And an under stocked and overpriced Macy’s, sans rubble. Not to mention a couple dozen other stores as well. And you start to wonder, what new ground has really been covered? And what’s going to happen to the former Target, anyway? And—of most pressing concern—when am I going to find the time to travel to our neighboring town to shop? Because I’m pretty sure I don’t think I want to spend a dime of this particular spending money at JC Penny or Target. At least until I read over the stack of coupons JC Penny sent this week.

No Chance For Lance?

Lance Armstrong’s bid for an 8th Tour de France win is in serious jeopardy. Turns out the cyclist has fallen a full four minutes behind the completion and stands little chance of out peddling the deficit.

Four minutes? Really?

If Lance can’t recover from being four minutes off course then what hope is there for me? At my current pace, I estimate that I’m falling a full 24 hours behind schedule each day. To date, I’ve faced my situation gamely, tacking each day’s list right to the bottom of the one from the day before. I simply watch the list unfurl before me like a well-charted, albeit lengthy course. Before the word on Lance, it never occurred to me that I might be in real trouble.

I’m on full alert now, oh-so-aware of the second hand traveling circles around the clock like so many revolutions of Lance’s wheels.

Lance may still be four minutes behind, but I’ve lost another fifteen just writing this post.

Queen of the Garden

“There’s been another kill!”

The daybreak headlines from around our house have, of late, included enumeration of the nighttime conquests of our jet black Whiskered Wrongdoer, Camille.

Plaintive, still-of-the-night meows typically alert us when a successful night of hunting has occurred. The only element of surprise is who, exactly, has succumbed to the nighttime carnage.

Initially, it was just this guy:



He may look innocent like an innocent designer screen wipe, but to Camille’s predator gaze this seemingly innocuous toy/tool combo is public enemy #1. Making regular prone appearances on thresholds and belly up on carpets, this poor creature has been killed more times than Kenny.

Over time, Camille’s thirst for fluff has rendered her emboldened. She’s been stalking larger prey from higher shelves, putting the stuffed community on notice that it’s open season.

We emerge, then, from our respective bedrooms , stepping gingerly around a trail of carcasses. The body count typically consists of a couple of downed finger puppets, a washcloth folded in the likeness of a baby bunny, and a handful of small creatures of the beanie/stuffed variety.

For several weeks and counting, I’ve been trying to obtain footage of a kill for documentary purposes. I keep my digital camcorder at the ready, prepared to move in at the faintest wail. When readiness alone yielded disappointing results, I’ll admit to baiting the cat by planting favorite nemeses in provocative positions throughout the home. Although the creatures invariably turned up limp in doorways , or out of doors altogether-- as the dogs dutifully drag the kill out to the lawn--it didn’t go down in my viewfinder.

“Just think, Mom, the National Geographic photographers are out in the wild for months, and even they might only get one good shot,” my son consoled me. I suppose he has a point. To date, all I have to show for myself are clips of the after-the-fact variety:




Undaunted, I continued my attempts to film the phenomenon, grabbing my camcorder just the other day when sounds of a rare daytime kill pierced the home. Walk with me, if you will, to witness the crime first hand:




Now, I know there wasn’t much in the way of action, here, but did you happen to get a good look at the perp? Recall from the written description and prior video that our Feline of Interest is solid jet black. Replay the footage, if you must, but the stripy gray hide and white nose of this suspect is a tell tale indicator that what we’re dealing with here is a copycat crime. Worse, according to Wikipedia, my fascination with documenting the delinquency may have encouraged, or even caused it. “Sensational publicity about violent murders or suicides to result in more of the same through imitation,” reads the Wikipedia entry on the Copycat Theory. The entry continues with an even more troubling assessment of my copy kitty’s mental health and stability:

“It has been shown that most of the persons who do mimic crimes seen in the media (especially news and crime movies) have in most cases prior criminal records, prior severe mental health problems or histories of violence suggesting that the effect of the media is indirect (more affecting criminal behaviour) rather than direct (directly affecting the number of criminals. It has also been seen that there is a certain small population of people who are at more risk for harmful media influences than the general audience.”

As bad as the Wikipedia report appears, it fails to cover what is, perhaps, the most troubling element of the whole sordid affair. That green blob that Little Xerox decided to take down? It’s a knitted shamrock.

Remapping Adventurous Terrain

I’ve gone to bed every night for the past month hoping I’ll wake up in a hotel room, preferably in 2007.

Flipping the calendar to the present month and failing to see a large segment of the squares blocked out for travel spawned this irrational wish and concomitant listlessness. The last time I was this desperate for adventure, it ended poorly, in the form of murder at a downtown Ethiopian restaurant .

It’s July, and according to my calendar, I’m only destined to cross the state line once, and that’s just to Maryland. And although the Maryland weekend is a long anticipated and indisputably joyous occasion (a belated graduation celebration with friends and family), it’s just not quite July-caliber on the excursion scale. Past Julys have seen me commune with wildlife in the southern hemisphere,




consume wild berries in a Maine forest,




consume ripe raspberries on a Northwest farm,



enjoy authentic cuisine on a Mexican construction site,



or, better yet, simply disappear into the heart of the country as I did for the entire month in 2007. Waking up to fresh adventures in different states every day—let’s just say I’d still be out there somewhere if August hadn’t summoned.



It’s been a few Julys—circa ‘05, I believe, since I last found myself largely home for the month. That year, I had decided to head off disappointment by adopting a vacation-at-home mentality in which I would do one new thing every day of the summer: I’d go to unfamiliar parts of town, experiment with unexplored buttons on my electronics, sample unfamiliar food. It was mere days, perhaps only hours into my home-style adventure mindset when Ethiopian cuisine emerged as my experience du jour, but to my surprise and chagrin, I couldn’t convince my family to gamble their dinner on Ethiopian fare. The menu I procured was shunned and historical facts about regional famine were cited; in short, it became clear that if I were to sample east African fare, it would be during a solo lunch.

Alas, by lunchtime the next day I received an I-told-you-so-style phone call from my husband. The Ethiopian restaurant, he reported, had been shut down in the wake of violence which erupted the previous evening. In my husband’s opinion, the resulting murder was a cautionary tale on straying too far outside the carefully patterned lines of safe, familiar, and ordinary. Although I am sure I did not agree, I can’t seem to recall much coming from my summer of the experimental. It’s almost as though the Ethiopian meal was some sort of prerequisite that lingered, perpetually unsatisfied.

Which brings me full circle to the current month. I toyed with the idea of Daily Random Adventures 2.0, but wound up retooling the whole package. See, I’m still all about embracing new experiences, whether I make a specific, daily, point of it or not. Perhaps that’s why I don’t have a lot of concrete memories of the ’05 experiment—they’ve just sort of melded into the general hodgepodge of craziness that I refer to as “normal.”

What I’ve come to realize is that the adventures I’m really supposed to be seeking right now are all about enhancing the lives of other people. So I’ve made it a point to volunteer for a few more things than I typically might (or had time to, during my Academic Phase.) I’m taking some risks, picking up the phone and not know what I might find myself into. I’ll going outside my comfort zone, too, all next week when I set the alarm for 5:45 so I can do crafts with inner city kids. I’m switching it up the following week, devoting my evenings to dabbling in the art scene at my church’s VBS. I’m looking beyond what will give me my daily thrill, and finding that I get it anyway.

So I guess you can say that I’m blocking out the second half of July ’09 as a home-based mission trip. I may wake up in my own bed each morning, but I’ll be traveling beyond the borders of my own interests. I’m stretching my definition of adventure, and discovering that it was too narrow anyway.

Optical Illusion

It’s been nearly a decade since 2k specs made their appearance on the celebratory circuit, and my sister and I nearly missed the fashion sensation altogether.

The subject comes up for at least a quarter hour every December 31st, at the apex of our New Year’s Eve festivities as we pause our rented film to witness the descending of the orb in Times Square. With a click of the remote, throngs of revelers crash comparatively muted gathering. Although the distinctions between us and the Big Apple partiers are numerous, in the heat of our disappointment, the lack of decade shades among our number seems the most glaring.

“Sister,” one of us exclaims to the other, “if we were wearing such festive glasses, it would be us having all the fun.”

“Ah, yes,” the other of us replies, “how shortsighted of us. We’ll have to get some next year. Then that will be us,” we say, looking longingly toward the on-screen merriment.

Despite these annual conversations, neither my sister nor I have ever owned turn of the century glasses in any year’s model—until now. Always abreast on the latest trends, my sister was quick to act when she discovered that year-themed eye-wear has gone academic, popping up at graduations everywhere. Within hours of turning in my final final, my sister appeared at my house with—you guessed it—Decade Shades 9.0, the Farewell Edition. (My sister and I came to the sad conclusion on December 31, 2008 that 2010 shades just won’t work, unless asymmetrical eye-wear with awkward nose bridge is unlikely to catch on).

Of course, I was immediately eager to see the view through numerically-rimmed glasses. I expected 20/20 vision, reading my hot-off-the press credentials through designer celebratory wear. But if I’m to be honest, I must admit I ’m a little disappointed in the clarity.

Last week I hosted a somewhat belated graduation dinner for some recent high school grads. Talk circled around careers and programs, scholarships and plans. I’d like to report that I had the same sense of direction when I was their age, but I don’t know if I can ever recall having a similar level of certainty about anything. It was refreshing, actually—at least until the moment the girls asked what happens next for me, and the conversation turned down a vague and meandering path as I admitted that I really don’t know.

As the days pass, I’ve come to the realization that the calendar may say July, but for me, it’s been December 31st since mid-June, with me walking around in my party shades wondering what the next several hundred days may see.

A Taxing Situation

“Will I be getting a bailout?” my son inquired with an earnest squeak.

He’d just completed his first job application, following a tip about a particular fast food joint known for including a token 14-year old on the payroll, and my husband was helping him estimate his post-tax earnings should the job materialize. Evidently, he found the numbers so staggering his thoughts immediately went to bailout.

When my husband explained that he’d get some of the money back when he did his taxes, the poor kid blanched. “I have to do taxes?” he asked. It was one thing to have the government take taxes, but the news that he might have to do taxes exacted quite a toll.

“What if I don’t do it? Will I be audited?”

“Audited? No, you go to jail for not doing your taxes,” my husband informed him.

“I can go to jail over this?” Despair washed over the boy. “What if I just can’t do taxes?”

“Son, it’s a simple one page form. It should only take you a couple minutes.”

Brandon fell silent. “Dad?”

“Yes, Son?”

“If I get this job, I’ll have just as many jobs as you do. What takes you so long?”

Post Post Postscript

It took me four days, but once again I’ve learned that there are reasons why I’ve established certain guidelines for general operation.
I don’t, for instance, eat chocolate in the car, because every time I do—no matter how cold the temperature or careful the consumption—I end up with brown stains in unfortunate places.

I never leave my camera bag open on a table or counter top, because I know the first time I do, one of my five furry creatures will manage to get a paw or a snout tangled in the handle and whatever lenses or gadgets happen to be in the bag will take a hard downward tumble.

After the unpleasant experience of arriving at a remote travel destination only to discover that my glasses case contained nothing but air, I’ve adopted the maxim my sister promotes to her bespectacled brood: “on your face, or in the case.”

And this morning—a full four days after my last post—I remembered why I don’t post at night. We’re all familiar with the disappointment of finding the perfect comeback or clever quip hours or days after it would have been witty. I get that feeling anew every time I post at night. I’ll wake up in the morning with the word I struggled to find the night before just hanging out in my head. The connecting link between two thoughts that I couldn’t quite articulate the night before suddenly appears obvious. Embarrassed, I’ll hop out of bed, hoping I can change the offending prose with my readers none the wiser—only to find a comment or two. I’ll still make the change—but now I know that members of my readership experienced draft-quality copy—all because I didn’t take advantage of the delay feature we’re denied in real –time communication, but should use in full online. The opportunity to sleep on your one-liners and retorts—what a deal! We’d all be such witty people if it were real life.

I, of course, have given up on real-life wit and have tossed all of my metaphorical eggs in a single online shopping cart, so you’d think I’d take full advantage of the chance at a well-oiled delivery. But no, I put Monday’s post to bed with a snoozer of an ending simply because I was too tired to craft a real eye-popper.

I didn’t think about the post again until this morning, when I woke up with the post’s current and rightful ending just hanging out just below the surface of my consciousness, where I undoubtedly would have found it Tuesday morning, if I patiently reserved posting.

Having resolved the issues with my prior post (check out the better ending!), my concern now turns to the one you’re currently reading. I began it on Friday, but have just realized I typed straight though midnight into Saturday. I’m thinking of throwing caution to the wind and sending it off into cyberspace. Oh, I know if I do, I risk ending up with egg on my face when I read it later on, which would leave me just one indiscretion away from having chocolate on the back of my khakis as well. At that point, it’s anyone’s guess what kind of rebuttal you might find here by Wednesday.

The Lost City of Philville, a Missing Memo, and Everything OK Anyway

Issues pertaining to the missing city of Philville—a tannish, mid-sized, dome tent that housed my nephew (Phil, of Philville fame) and son in the mountains of PA and the rainy wilderness of Maine during the summer of ’08—consumed the first leg of our trip to Creation 09. My sister had generously offered Philville to us on loan when an episode of frenzied, pre-trip planning revealed a shortage tent housing in my own jurisdiction. So I left my house with tents for my husband, daughter, and myself, and drove to my sister’s house to pick up my son and bonus son (who’d spent the night at her house), and Philville to shelter them.

Moments before pulling out of the driveway, however, it became apparent that Philville had gone the way of Atlantis. A quick recap of last summer yielded a scant lead or two, but no hard evidence of Philville’s current status. At present, the fate of Philville remains unknown.

In the interest of time and replenishing our own stock of tents, we decided to pick up a new one enroute. Unfortunately, our pastoral path offered us few options for wilderness outfitting. Our TomTom GPS system assured us that if we overshot our destination by a full 11 miles, we’d arrive at a Wal-Mart where we could certainly hope to resolve our equipment deficiencies. I was immediately skeptical, as our GPS has failed us so often as to have lost credibility with even my longsuffering husband, which is saying quite a bit. Having dumped us repeatedly at the doorsteps of homes billed as Dunkin Donuts and vacant lots bearing no resemblance to desired destinations, my husband has even silenced the system’s sound, using it as sort of a backup directory of suggestions, rather than the voice of authority.

True to form, TomTom guided us to a dilapidated stoop in the heart of a hick burg where we were momentarily buoyed by the sight of a familiar department store sign. OK, so what if it was a Sears instead of a Wal Mart—no matter, we thought, until we stepped into the a one-room showroom not appreciatively larger than the lower floor of my home. In stock were a handful of tools and a state of the art washer and dryer combo, but nothing of apparent use in the field. After equally low-yielding forays into dollar and hardware establishments, the boys waxed grim.

Fortunately, as a child, my husband read a how-to book about tent construction, and was able to formulate a plan C involving some tarps, twine, and a tie-in to our rain shelter. The breezy lean-to that resulted actually kept the boys dry during one of the two storms we encountered, but I’ve gotten ahead of myself.

The hours lost in pursuit of basic shelter caused my prospects for hoped-for press conferences with Relient K and Skillet to go as damp as the boys’ post storm two accommodations, but there I go again on fast forward.

I eventually checked in at the on-site media trailer only to discover that I hadn’t missed any press conferences. In fact, even if our quest for shelter had taken all weekend, I wouldn’t have missed a single one. Why? Because there weren’t any press conferences scheduled for Creation 09. According to a memo I never received, the long-standing press-conference formula was replaced by pre-arranged interviews, of which I had none.

Friendly, fast-acting staff assured me that all was not lost. Although I had no hope of face time with any of the headliners—no follow-up on my mid-00’s Relient K spread in YS this year—I just might be able to speak with some up-and-comers. An up-and-comer myself, I decided that this was a fine idea, especially as I’d be getting exclusive material. I ended up with highly publishable interviews with newly minted Goatee recording artist Stephanie Smith, and The Sunflowerz, a chick-duo from Colorado.

Of course Regular Readers inclined toward the mathematical arts will likely note that two interviews falls short of the six stories I hoped to glean from the event, but I’m OK with that, especially as I may be able to parlay the material into multiple articles with varying angles.

And the boys? Even though their shelter was eventually blown asunder in a swift Friday storm that left them camping in the van, I don't think they'd have traded the experience even if TomTom himself managed to guide us straight to Philville.

Mug Shot

Today, I drink from the mug.

No Beach Balls

On a recent sunny Friday I gathered up some reading material— riveting articles such as “The Eight Components of Sheltered Instruction,” and “Language Acquisition: The Pidginization Hypothesis”—and headed beachward.

It goes without saying, I’m sure, that I found my beach reads so engrossing that I did not immediately absorb the shoreline ambiance. I was focused on fossilized language development, psychological distance, and sundry other hypotheses that diverted attention from my sandy environs.

After awhile, though, I sensed that all was not well on the beachfront. Something seemed decidedly off on the periphery of my secluded haven of shells, shore, and sea. Instinctively, I turned to my right and dropped my literature as a fond dream instantly went the way of low tide. I blinked, but the scene didn’t shift—it was true. Readers, I am sad to report that my Future Studio of Art and Society has been reduced to nothing save a cement slab.

For years running, I’ve been certain that somehow, someday, I was destined to purchase the charming little weather beaten house on the rocky seaside hill. It had only been a matter of when, but in my mind alone, the plan was certain.

By day, the little saltbox habitat would house unbridled artistic revelry. In the mornings, I’d pen lively works in my oceanfront writing studio. After lingering lunches of teas, fruit, and finger sandwiches, I would dabble in the visual arts. Doubtless, I’d have a kiln.

By night, I’d throw terrific, Gastby-esque parties, where friends, guests, and artists would mingle amongst my mosaics, sculptures, and hand-crafted décor sipping spirits and nibbling cheeses before heading shore side for a bonfire that would burn to embers at sunrise.

It was all so good. I loved it so. You would have, too. Under different circumstances, I might be posting little save-the-date-style blurbs, encouraging you to keep an eye on your mailboxes for an embossed envelope. But alas, we are left to gather here in this simple online forum. At this point, I can only hope that the written glimpse into the inner workings of my Past-Tense Future Studio of Art and Society has been at least as absorbing as the literature with which I arrived seaside.

A Little Like Limbo

The dilemma here at Running With Letters for the past couple weeks has been whether or not to lower the bar for the sake of a new post.

I am of the mindset that blog posts should be reasonably well-crafted and at least semi-polished, sort of like pottery with a rustic patina. Of late, I haven’t had time for witty commentary. Writing prose that reads breezily and appears effortless is really a laborious exercise in illusion.

So I’ve let the cobwebs begin to accumulate—a decision that comes with a set of consequences perhaps more lethal to the would-be up-and-coming blogger than slightly off-kilter copy: silence. Whisper-low hit counts, the same screen echoing two-week old commentary. Not good.

Which brings us, real-time, to the current post: hardly groundbreaking, but yet functional; a utilitarian message just to say I’m alive, and that I can still string a few sentences together. But sometimes functional and utilitarian is all you’ve got—and I’m a great believer in working in the tangible medium of the messy present. Even if it is a little rough around the edges.

In Other News:

T-5 days until I drink my morning coffee from the alumni mug.

I’m officially moving the much-desired Art Job to reside among the ranks of Things That Would Have Been Nice, rendering my status as Unemployed and Without Prospects.

Hypochondria is currently at bay, but hovering slightly beneath the surface

I secured my press credentials, and will be covering Creation East June 24-27. I claimed in my official paperwork that I “believe I can reasonably expect to place about half a dozen articles” based on this year’s press conferences. Fulfilling this ambition will require a significant hoisting of said bar to accommodate the raising of my game.

A Midterm Report

I'm interrupting the extended awkward silence with a word of explanation. I'm smack in the middle of one last, stiff dose of academia in the form of a month-long pair of summer classes that are as intense as they are swift. I'm holding my own, but suffering some pretty nasty side effects which include an inability to perform intellectually-based tasks outside of class.

In other news:

My recent publishing portfolio is so slim as to have called into question my ability to secure press credentials for an upcoming event I hoped to cover.

No word on the aforementioned art job at the desirable locale. I'm actually starting to think the whole notion was just a vivid dream.

These days, I don't read anything that isn't written in a dry, jargon-esque tone capable of inducing instant slumber.

I signed up for a summer painting class at the local art gallery.

I recently underwent the penultimate procedure in my staged hairstyle reconstruction plan

Summer can't get here soon enough.

Foolproof

"One of my life’s firmest principals has been this: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me three times, shame on both of us."

--Stephen King, from On Writing

Oh, the shame of it all…layers and layers of pure, unadulterated shame. Readers, I’ve been had again by my own personal arch nemesis, and, what’s worse, my adversary bested me using all the usual tricks. Nothing new in the arsenal, no unforeseen twist or shocking spin—I simply proved myself more gullible than a third grader in a bad lunch swap.

Regular Readers know of my propensity to fall victim to severe bouts of hypochondria. You may even recall the 54 I once scored on the Whiteley Self Test for Hypochondria. (In the interest of perspective: a score of 44 +/-11 indicates a positive result; 55 represents the Top Score). If you’ve been with me since the beginning, you’ve met Dr. M, my long suffering General Practitioner, and been introduced to The Crazy Herb Lady, my wonderfully eccentric homeopath.

I used the above phrase “since the beginning” in acknowledgment of the fact that I haven’t blogged much about my hypochondria recently. Graduate School was many things, but one of the most beneficial was its ability to keep me focused and, frankly, too busy to respond to the taunts and insults of my Inner Hypochondriac.

But I’ve had a full 10 days of near-complete inactivity preceded by a nearly 3-week stint of moderate occupation which apparently rendered me ripe for the picking when a visit with The Crazy Herb Lady--a long overdue (haven’t been in nearly 2 years) check-up in the interest of continued health and vitality-- took an unexpectedly grim turn. Seems I have some frankly alarming systems on the fritz, due no doubt to my breach in medical vigilance during my graduate studies. And—bam, gotcha—just like that hypochondria captured my metaphorical flag. And I didn’t even know it.

I spent a couple too many days in a semi-fog of anxiety, gloom, and general dread before I realized I’d been played. It was as though I walked right into a trap. Almost invariably, my most gripping episodes of hypochondria have unfolded during “lulls”—times when I have just a few too many unstructured hours in the week. Often this happens in May, as the hustle and bustle of the school year ends and before summer hits its full stride. Something will seem a little off, a symptom will appear—some seed, something real enough to give structure to an impending certainty that my anomalies signal outcomes on the far awful end of the range of possibilities.

A cough? Lung cancer, guaranteed. A burrowing tick? A rampant case of highly aggressive melanoma. Stomach ache? Colon or ovarian cancer, if not both.

It goes down like this every time. And I fall for it. Again and again, each time convinced of merits of my new symptoms, solidly certain that it won’t turn out as good as it did last time. Or the time before that. Or that.

Never scoring well on those portions of standardized tests which call for pattern-recognition prowess, I floundered for some time before recognizing the blueprint. But I’ve got it now. Really. My nemesis may have no shame, but now that I know how the fiend presents I can implement some early-detection screening. Because it would really be a shame to let myself get fooled again.

Organizing the Corner Shelf, Part 1

My stint as an avid reader was severely hobbled almost two weeks ago by the sudden and sobering realization that I’d deceived myself into believing that I was far closer than I really was to completing a project I heard alternately referred to as a “work sample” and the more chilling “masters thesis.”

It was easy to keep turning page upon page of leisure material when I thought of this project as a benign and friendly “work sample,” a simple accounting of what I’d been doing over the preceding months. Hearing the project later labeled as a “masters thesis” proved somewhat of a literary show stopper.

With the capstone project now just a fading memory, I’m back with a breakdown of what worked and what didn’t in my recent corner shelf selections.

I was excited to read Sarah Dessen’s YA bestseller The Truth About Forever after a high school student favorably compared my writing to Dessen’s—a fact that I probably wouldn’t have admitted prior to actually reading the book, thinking it unseemly to compare myself to a New York Times best-selling author in a public forum. However, after reading the book, I’m not feeling nearly as flattered by the remark as I formerly may have been tempted.

As discussed in The Portable MFA (a current corner shelf pick), when it comes to fiction, questions perform the all-important function of engaging the reader-- and the sooner the better, if you want your reader to keep turning pages. Trouble was, Dessen’s novel didn’t prompt much in the way of inquiry. From the dust cover forward, I had a pretty solid bead on what I’d find clear through the final paragraph. I found myself on page 177 before any real complication presented itself, and made it fully to page 315 until I felt so much as a flicker of real concern. I understand that it’s a character-driven novel, and I’m fine with that, provided I’m invested enough in the character to really care.

Unfortunately, I just wasn’t.

To really pull off a character-driven novel, the author has to work doubly hard to render a compelling character—because, let’s face it, the protagonist now has the burden of carrying the whole story. Oh, I’ll admit to a baseline level of general concern for protagonist Macy, and I’ll concede that the cast eclectic New Friends she meets through her accidental catering job had a lot of literary potential. Based on early impressions of Dessen’s cast, I might have been tempted to say that the novel committed no greater crime than to be a member of the rabble The Portable MFA fingers for “introducing a wonderful character, but little drama or action.” However none of Truth’s characters quite make it to wonderful status, due, I would argue, to never reaching full development.

I got a taste of who these characters might be, and the shame of it is, I might have really liked them. Dessen effectively employed the technique of giving all her characters unique, instantly identifiable mannerisms—and promptly brushed her hands and called it a wrap, at least in the case of the support cast.

But what I found most disturbing was that Dessen’s idea of bringing her character out of a prison of perfectionism and grief to ultimately embrace life, in its flaws, imperfections and uncertainty relied so heavily on the late night party scene. Perhaps what’s most puzzling is that the party setting almost seemed gratuitous—the New Friends who introduce Macy to the party scene come off as offbeat, quirky kids that you wouldn’t expect to find at a kegger anyway. You picture them as independent, free thinkers that wouldn’t fit the stereotype.

And the big truth about forever? Is simply that--brace yourselves—it’s always changing, as in “for any one of us our forever could end in an hour, or a hundred years from now” (p 135). Dessen’s weak spin on the death as a catalyst for life theme fell flat for me, largely as a world view issue. Viewing forever as a concept that bridges this world and extends into eternity makes it tough to see through to what was probably her real point: live in the moment, the future is uncertain.

I’ll post some (shorter) comments about my other corner shelf selections in a later post. I’m not really accustomed blogging book reviews, but there was a fair amount of interest when I posted the link to my original corner shelf post on facebook, so I thought I’d continue the thread.

Spoiler alert for next week: look for a swift unraveling of literary commentary and a return to our Regular Programming (long awkward silences followed by equally long posts documenting various fiascos) as I begin the month-long finale of my masters program. Five weeks until I drink my coffee from the alumni mug!

Pots and Plans

Today I performed my penultimate act at The Office. Regular Readers may be shocked to learn that my days of jammed copiers, botched filing, and general clerical mayhem have run their course, effectively drawing to a close an entire subplot here at Running With Letters. Readers may also find it fitting that I spent my second-to- last shift building an office blog. Endless days of editing, formatting, and jury-rigging an online newsletter using a program no one in the office really knows-- and is meant for designing print publications, anyway--ended poorly when the communications department feigned a near total lack of knowledge of our department and said they couldn’t possibly convert our humble file into html in less than 4-6 weeks.

Dr. S. lamented that there must be a better way—and let’s face it, when you’re talking about posting 6-month-old news online, there’s ALWAYS a better way—which led to what may be my first, last, and only bona fide good Office Idea—why not blog? So I spent an hour or so making attractive little posts out of all our newsletter items. From now on, the new Graduate Assistants will be able to post news, hot off the press, in seconds flat. Tomorrow I’ll type up some instructions on how to keep it rolling—passwords and the like—and just like that, my days as a Graduate Assistant will be over.

Which doesn’t mean we’ll be lacking in material here on this blog—just as The Office subplot draws to a close, an exciting new possibility may be waiting in the wings. It seems--in what could prove to be the world’s shortest job search-- that I may have stumbled upon a part-time Art Job at a most desirable locale! I almost hesitate to even mention it at this early stage, but it’s hard to avoid the topic as this post finds me surrounded by a heap of application-esque paperwork…

…second only in mass to the potted plants huddled in sad little clusters around my property, following a foliage-buying binge last weekend. These plants—several purchased in a mini-binge the previous weekend and already languishing—were to have been planted on Sunday afternoon. However, in an Uncharacteristically Responsible decision I opted to spend an hour typing research before going out for a long, sunny stretch of gardening which I saw extending into the evening hours.

Unfortunately for a sad group of limp limas, teetering tomatoes, and peaked peppers, this hour of so-called responsibility may prove fatal, as that single hour I spent typing represented the final moments of stable weather we Virginians last saw. The skies went suddenly black and poured with a vengeance. The sun re-emerged, then dissolved into torrential rain, dark skies, and odd mists, which have persisted in a loop of continuous Instability. We lost a full quarter hour of a particularly intense episode of House on Monday, as our local weather man gave a street by street breakdown of various apparitions of hail, wind, and potential tornado activity. The weather man eventually stopped talking, although I saw no change in atmospheric conditions that should have prompted an end to his newscast.

Which leaves us waiting, the plants and I, to see what comes with the sun, or wind, or mist tomorrow.

What's in Your Pocket? -or- An All Points Literary Advisory

Consider today’s post as an All-Points Literary Advisory, with a splash of fashion advise. It’s National Poem in Your Pocket Day, and official organizational literature indicates that the general public should be on the alert for clustered groups of troubadours, bards, and average citizens assembled for readings in parks, libraries, schools, workplaces, and bookstores. I’d hate to think of any of my readers turning up with empty pockets should an impromptu Unfolding break out at your place of business.

I realize that perhaps I’ve failed to get this out to you in time for much advance planning. Perhaps you’re reading this right now at your desk, poemless, sans pockets even, and panicking ever so slightly as you see a small gathering forming at the water cooler. Relax. Let’s work through this together. If you’re fortunate enough to have a favorite poet, go online and print off a poem. If you have no poetry preferences, just google a poet—any one will do: use a name you remember from freshman comp, go back mentally to high school if you must. Frost. Dickinson. Pound. Just pick one, and print off something vaguely pocket sized—don’t worry if you don’t have an actual pocket, I’m sure a purse, wallet, or shoe will do, in the spirit of the thing.

As for me, I’m a William Carlos Williams enthusiast, but a quick online check doesn’t summon my favorite of his works, The Flower, but no matter—that’s a little larger-than-pocket sized anyway. Today I’ll go with:

This Is Just To Say

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

--William Carlos Williams

And, see, just like that, I’m prepared. I’ll have Williams at the ready to brandish at will should the need arise. You should get prepared, too--I won’t keep you. And just in case you’re afraid of going through all the trouble of arming yourself with literature only to suffer the disappointment of not stumbling upon a Great Unfolding—fear not. You already have! Let’s see what you’ve got…