going old school

Today our son had a shadow day at Archbishop Spalding school. For those not involved in the private school admission process, a "shadow day" is a day spent with a student of the school, attending classes with them, eating lunch in the cafeteria, along with a short interview and a writing sample.

We also had our parent interview the same day.

The school was very old-fashioned. I felt like I had been transported back to my high school. Cinderblock painted walls, ugly dark hallways, joyless students slumped over desks... GRIM.

Our son hated it. I was glad he didn't like it. I must be raising him right ;-)

Learning theory has come along way. Architectural design has made leaps and bounds. Work is no longer factory based/ So why are there still this factory style schools, churning out people whose main asset is the ability to sit at a desk for long periods of time?

Ugh.

poking procrastination in the eye

I am poking procrastination right in the eye. I have my paper topic approved, and it isn't even due for two more weeks. I bought my first xmas present today, and it isn't even close to xmas (by my reckoning). WOW!!!!

This isn't me. I wait until the very last minute, using that good old panic sweat as fuel. I can't seem to get moving without the jolt of adrenaline added by the fear of blowing a deadline.

So why the turnaround? I think I am just panicking early....

application is in the mail

Our son's high school application to The Park School is in the mail. I have very mixed feelings about it. I want him to get in, if it's the right place for him. It is a lovely school, with the right values (i.e. mine). It is the kind of opportunity I want to provide. But. Is it right for my child, or is it right for me? Am I setting him up for success, or for failure? He would fit in, socially. He is certainly smart enough. But are his skills up to it?

Oh well. It is now out of my hands. We will see what happens.

a grateful heart

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving. I have had a great year, and I'm approaching the holiday with a grateful heart. I give thanks for my wonderful husband, a terrific son, friends who enrich my life, a good and challenging job, interesting classes, amazing in-laws, a healthy new niece, a strong new connection with my brother.

I am truly lucky, and grateful for all of it!!

steeped in evil

It is the beginning of the holiday season, and I am steeped in evil. It is term-paper time. My tentative title is "A Candle in the Darkness: The Treatment of Evil in Literature". We have to cover all twelve works we read this semester, and discuss the treatment of evil, and posit our own theories. We also have to use at least 5 outside sources.

So every night I read a little evil. So far, I have read People of the Lie, The Roots of Evil, and am working through The History of Hell, and Evil, Ethics and Literature. It is amazing how a scholarly treatment of the subject can suck all the life out of it. Evil should be fascinating. It should be the car wreck you can't turn away from on the highway. It should be the thing you know is waiting in the dark basement. The poised snake, waiting to strike. It should not be dull.

It should be exciting enough to write a 18-20 page paper in the next three weeks.

the expanding universe

I am enjoying watching my son's universe expand. This weekend he went with friends to Anime USA, an anime convention in Virginia. While there, he bought himself some jewelry (!) and some art (!!). Neither of these things has been on his horizon before. He is starting to be cognizant that clothing says something about you. It is a kind of social shorthand. And he can express his taste and interests through jewelry and art.

On Saturday he went to the con with several other teens, one of the kids' mother and her boyfriend. Today he went with a girl he "likes" and her mother. He navigated both social settings quite well, something he would not have been able to do even two years ago.

He is starting to find himself, and is beginning the journey of separating from us. It is a real pleasure to watch. It is more subtle than the excitement we felt when he started walking and talking, but it is no less momentous, I think.

And sweet.

Coveting

Coveting is probably not good for the soul, but god help me, I COVET this:




This is from datamancer.net and if you haven't checked out his site, you really should. He is a craftsman, and has created a number of gorgeous items in the steampunk genre.

If I won the lottery, I would buy everything he has for sale. I really truly would. Daily objects should be things of beauty.

thirteen is not a man

Okay, this is for all the lonely teachers out there. Thirteen is NOT a man. You may feel affection for your thirteen year old student. It is only affection. It is not LOVE, not lust. You are NOT soulmates.

The teacher that ran off to Mexico with her 13 year old student was just fired from her job. Before now, she was on administrative leave, despite having crossed state lines with a 13 year old boy.

I admit that this whole story hit a sore spot with me. I am the mother of a thirteen year old boy. I have spent thirteen years protecting him, watching out for him, warning him about strangers, when I apparently should have been telling him his teachers are DANGEROUS. Seriously, as my son has gotten older, I have started to relax. I assume pedophiles like kids that look like, well, kids. So as my son matures, I have begun to think he is "safe" from this sort of creep. And then another thirteen year old gets abused by a teacher.

Enough is enough.

public vs private education

A neighbor stopped by last night, to let me know about a community project. Our neighborhood is adopting the local elementary school, Govans Elementary. We will be purchasing much needed supplies from a wish-list each teacher provided. In my case, this means baby wipes, disinfectant wipes, and sweat pants (I have a pre-K classroom for this time).

We are doing this for complicated reasons, many of which come down to guilt. We don't send our children to Govans. Almost exclusively, the neighborhood children attend private schools in the area. Govans is a poor, urban elementary school, attended mostly by the children in the adjoining neighborhoods.

Most of us feel bad for abandoning the public school system. We "believe" in public education, we feel it is important, but we don't act on our belief, at least not in the form of putting our children into the school. And we realize that pulling our kids out makes the system weaker. We are involved parents who truly care about our kids getting the best education, i.e. we are exactly what the school needs to improve. The new principal of the school, when asked what the neighborhood could do to help, was pretty succinct. "Send your kids here."

If it were that simple, I would cheer. But. The school is terrible. It isn't working for the kids who are there now, and it wouldn't work for my child. I am unwilling to sacrifice my child's best interests for my principles.

So how do we get to the point where the public schools are good, and we don't need private schools to fill the gap? One of this country's greatest strengths is our free education, available to all children. It weakens us when we have a two-tier system, with good education for those who can afford it, and a poor education for everyone else. We need people with skills, with knowledge, in order for our country to thrive. How did we mess it up so badly? or has it always been this bad? and how do we fix it??

out of the blue

In the last couple of weeks, I've heard from two people that I had lost touch with. Oddly, I worked with both of them, at the same company, years ago, but heard from each separately and independently. I love this sort of "out of the blue" experience. It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy to know I am remembered.

I am also one of those people who look for patterns in things. So when I hear from two folks I knew in connection with each other, I see a pattern and wonder -- what is the universe telling me? Maybe nothing. Maybe things just line up that way some times, but I doubt it. I tend to think that the universe reveals itself (god, that sounds new agey as hell!) in bits and pieces, fits and starts. And so I watch, I listen, and hopefully I learn.

Choose civility

I LOVE THIS!!! Howard County has started a Choose Civility program, to encourage people to be more civil toward one another. I hope this catches on. I feel the breakdown in manners has been a real detriment to society.

A book by a Hopkins professor that I hope becomes a huge bestseller:
http://www.amazon.com/Choosing-Civility-Twenty-five-Considerate-Conduct/dp/0312281188

the older student

I am an "older" student, even in grad school. This hit home last night on two fronts. On one, I got a B on a paper, and was incredibly upset. The grade was fair, even generous, given what I turned in; it's just that I am used to As, expect As and really don't want to settle for less. I was not like this as an undergrad. I wasn't even like this in my 30s. I think more of myself now than I did then. I am smart, I am capable, and there really isn't any excuse for a B.

The 2nd front came in the form of an anecdote. My professor was on a tangent about gardening. Then she talked about how, the second you turn 50, you get that mail from AARP asking you to join, showing happy old people gardening. Then she looked around the room and said, "of course, none of you are anywhere near 50..." Ummm, yeah, right. I am at least 10 years older than the nearest person my age in the room... And am much closer to 50 than I like to think.

So, why aren't there more older students? is it because education has increasingly been seen in terms of career goals, and nothing else? if it can't get you advancement, should you skip it?

For what it's worth, and despite the difficulties, my B paper notwithstanding, I highly recommend going back to school. Do something different. Shake up your ideas and your life. Take Art, take music, hell take accounting if it floats your boat. Just go to school, so I can have some creaky, old company.

I need people

I need people, as in "I have people for that"... to give you an idea, this is my weekend:

I took my son to the Independent School Entrance Exams. I waited with him and tried to cheer him up until they took him in the room. Then I took the car to the dealer for its 75,000 mile service, and to get a new seat-belt (Largo ate through the other one). And a new battery. Then I drove back to the school, getting there just in time to pick up my son. Then I dropped him at home and went to the bank to deposit a check. I read my book for school for Tuesday night (Candide). I answered email from work. We went out to dinner with friends (Taste restaurant, very very nice evening). On Sunday, I went grocery shopping. I took videos back, bought Halloween decorations, went to PetSmart and got food for the dog. I hard boiled eggs and cooked some chicken breasts for later in the week. I did 5 loads of laundry. I cooked a turkey dinner with all the trimmings. We went to the Park School for an Open House/Tour. I checked in and answered work email. I ran the dog around the back yard for 20 minutes.

I'm tired. And oppressed by the things I left undone: bathrooms to clean, kitchen floor to mop, I haven't filed or put away paperwork for months. My dust bunnies are HUUUGGGEEE, with nasty fangs.

No seriously, I could use a few people to run my errands, clean my house, organize my paperwork. A simple Victorian staff of 2-3 would do it, I think. Or one horribly efficient butler...

it's not magic

I am working on some programming. It sounds fairly simple: create a bunch of custom documents for each of our speakers for a course and email them a packet. But a speaker can be a guest, or staff (different set of documents for each), some documents have to be merged on a per talk basis, some on a per speaker basis, some of the documents are compound docs (page 1 merges with speakers, page 2 -4 have to repeat for each talk, the last page is static, etc).

So I have a process that: merges to word, breaks apart the merges by speakers or talks, shoving the now individual docs into a folder or each speaker, then converts docs to pdfs, then makes multiple pdfs into single pdfs, then zipping contents of each speaker's folder, then attaches and emails with a customized email to each speaker and then cleans up after itself.

So, I have users wondering why this took so long to create, others that are like "thanks - can we change this 1 document here so that it does x?" etc.

I want someone, anyone, to recognize what a huge challenge this was, and how f***ing amazing I am for coming up with a solution at all. We have gotten to the point where they just expect me to solve everything, and so take my efforts for granted.

Like I wave my hands, and MAGIC -- we have new code.

what do we want our government to do for us

This topic came up in the car, on the way to doggie daycare (!). My son was telling me about a girl at his school, Gemma Frost. Her brother is the twelve year old student who testified before Congress about the sCHIP program (children's health insurance). For those of you not in the Baltimore area, you may not be aware that the Frost family has experienced an avalance of hate mail, invasion of privacy, threats, etc. since speaking up for the continued funding of the program

My son was horrified that this was even an issue. He felt all kids should have access to medical care. Period. I agree. So we started talking about what a government should do for its citizens, and why people would be angry at the Frosts. The anger is that many people feel insurance is a purely private thing; if you want it you buy it, and if you can't afford it, go without. And the Frosts are not poor. They are not rich, but they are not poor. They make ends meet, they own their own home, their children go to private schools (on scholarship, btw). But they are self-employed and do not get health insurance through an employer. Bottom line, they applied and were approved for the SCHIP program. Should they be homeless so they can buy insurance? Should they pull their kids out of their schools and put them in public school to make people feel better?

My argument this morning was that we have to decide what we want government to be, and to do. I feel that the government should protect the most vulnerable among us: the poor, the disabled, children, the elderly, because how we treat these people is what we are as a society. We are a well-off country that spends more on war than we spend on these vulnerable citizens.

So, what do you want from government? what kind of society should we be? and how do we get there?

avoiding my paper

So, I am supposed to be writing my paper for class. Right now. I have my books, I have my notes, I have my trusty laptop. And I am blogging. Writing to avoid writing. As usual, I changed the topic of my paper at the last second. I was going to write on Euripides Electra, but the play *sucks* -- the Greek tragedy equivalent of Atlas Shrugged. Lots of long speeches that interrupt the action so that the POINT can be hammered home.

So now I am writing on Christopher Marlowe's Doctor Faustus. Much better. But I keep getting distracted by the background stuff. Like there really was a Doctor Faust, and there was this book: The History of the Damnable Life and Deserved Death of Doctor John Faustus. It came before Marlowe's play, which came before Goethe's Faust, and so on. And Marlowe was a spy for the Queen. He was stabbed to death at age 29, maybe assassinated. And the play was published posthumously and probably was written as part of a team. A few years later, another edition was published with another 676 lines added, supposedly by Marlowe, but probably not.

So, writing about the theme and structure and the Evil in the play doesn't seem that interesting right now. Oh yeah, I also have to prepare a ten minute talk on my paper to present on Tuesday night. Did I mention this is all due Tuesday?

And I have to leave the house at 5:30am on Tuesday, so I can drive to NIH for a 4 hour meeting, then drive back to the office and work, and then go to class and turn in my paper.

And I got myself into this in the first place, because I like school. This is all voluntary. I don't have to do it. I should have my head examined.

how others see you

I was thinking last night about how others see me. In talking with a classmate, it was clear that she felt I was outgoing and confident. Stunned, I told her I sat through 4 years of college without ever raising my hand. And that not one of my professors would even remember who I was. She said she couldn't believe that was true.

Yet it was. I really did. I was afraid to answer questions, afraid I might seem stupid, afraid I might seem too smart, afraid I was uncool, unpopular, unliked. Mostly just afraid to be myself. I don't remember when it shifted, and I have always assumed that I still appear that way to others, even though I don't feel that way inside.

Is it age that makes you more you? is it experience? Is it that way for everyone? or is it just me? I know I feel like I haven't changed in decades. My "mental self" seems pegged at 22. I have to do the math in my head sometimes to remember how old I am. Yet something unquantifiable has changed; there is a difference in there somewhere. What would it be like, I wonder, if for one fleeting moment, you could see yourself as others see you?

blog about the environment

Nature is my religion, as much as I have one. I feel a sense of connectedness with the world when I am outdoors. I don't have a church. I don't believe in God, at least not the Christian one I grew up with. But I do love and appreciate the world we live in. I love the rivers, the mountains, the trees, the oceans, the creatures that share the planet with us.

I love the sounds and smells, wet raw earth, the air after a thunderstorm, the way warm wood smells different than cold, the trickle of a stream, the wind through the trees, waves crashing on shore, the salty odd smell of marshes.

This planet is a treasure, a museum, a great work of art. However you view it, it is irreplaceable and it is priceless. Try treating it that way.

Congratulations, Al!

I was stunned to see Al Gore awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. I think his efforts to educate the planet about global warming have been magnificent, and hopefully not too late. I just thought it was something of a stretch to connect it to Peace. However, in reading the comments from the committee, I agree, it is about Peace. It is about bringing the planet together, not for war, or for commerce, without special interests, to do something together about a problem that affects us all.

I am so pleased to see Al Gore rewarded for doing good. Too often, we see people garner attention for doing all the wrong things. It is a blessing, at least as a parent, to see someone rewarded richly for doing the right thing. Makes my job easier, when I tell my son to do what he loves, and not worry about profit. Gore seems happier than he ever was running for office. His income has soared, he is respected internationally, his ideas get attention, and he looks like he is having a blast. He is doing what he believes in and it shows.

Congratulations, Al, and keep at it. We need to hear it.

reading

This weekend, I read: King Lear by Shakespeare, and Forfeit, by Dick Francis. Guess which one I enjoyed more? If you said Shakespeare, you were way way off. I love Shakespeare, generally, but Lear is one of my least favorite plays, I think because I really don't like anyone but Cordelia, and she doesn't do or say much. I think I have read almost every single Dick Francis, and enjoyed every one. Can't name a single character, the plots are often interchangeable, and they deal with horse racing, which I know very little about. But they are a fun read.

There are books that I think I ought to like, or ought to have read, because they are considered classics. Literature with a capital L. And then there are things I absolutely should NOT enjoy, like comic books, that I thoroughly do. As I get older, I get more comfortable with the thought that I am not as sophisticated as I once thought I was. My tastes are just what they are -- and sometimes that means I am shallow, superficial or just plain brain dead.