No Internet!?

What is that? How can I work without internet? I have a smart phone so that not only can people call me at any time, but they also have constant access to me via email, twitter, or text message! Now, in my office, where I need to access wikis and blogs and my google reader to catch up on the stuff that is my work--I can't get anything?! I remember when cell phones first came out. Although I liked the idea and could see advantages, my mother (always ahead of the game with technology) had one. She answered it everywhere, at any time, even in the middle of a dinner conversation face-to-face. All of a sudden, my sister in another state was interrupting dinner conversation when my mother was a guest in my home! I thought the whole thing about constant access was overload. Eventually, I got a cell phone, of course. But I turn mine off sometimes, and I don't let it interrupt personal conversations. I like that, when I am waiting for a flat tire to get fixed, I can still do things like check email and text a friend. So, now that I'm dependent (in so many ways) on having access--3G, 4G--what next???--what do I do when I don't get the internet working in my office? Interestingly, we all open our doors and wander around in the halls, talking, until service is restored. . . and we can all get back to work. Funny. I hope this will post.

Hope for spring

I’m tired of cold and snow. I’m ready for warm and green. I’ve seen the start of buds on some of the trees in my yard. That means spring really is coming! Hooray! We have a north-facing lawn, so it still looks like winter there: the snow we shoveled from the driveway and walk onto the grass is still too deep to have melted, even though across the street those south-facing yards look like they’ve already been mowed. So, I look at their yards and not my own, look out the kitchen window at the baby buds starting to show on the maple tree there and feel hope rising. Spring isn’t just a dream. It will be a reality, and sometime soon. I hope.

Sunday-morning-for-Saturday post

I hate that feeling that you've forgotten to do something but you can't remember what it was. I woke up a little after 5:00 this morning (on a day when I finally could sleep in) with at least the memory of one thing I'd forgotten: to write my SOLS for Saturday--even though I'd intended it when I was on the computer in the afternoon. Here's what happened: my evening plans changed when my son-in-law asked if we could watch our grandchildren while he took our daughter to dinner. She'd had a long, hard week. How could we say no? So, we tended the three children and had a great time--but I forgot to write. So, two today. This one for yesterday.

Three images from tending the grand-kids:
1. When we asked Matthew, a kindergartner, how school was going, he announced he'd published several books. Grandpa said grandma had, too. "What's published?" asked Coley, Matthew's four-year-old sister. He said, "It's when you do all the stuff you're supposed to." Yep. That's it, all right.
2. Coley sitting on a stool at the counter, “helping” me prepare dinner. She had a stack of romaine leaves I had rinsed for a salad that she was tearing into a bowl. She tore up the whole stack, a surprise, but she chatted the WHOLE time, comments on this and that as she worked. When she finished, she announced, “My name should be changed to ‘Talker.’” Me: “Talker? Why?” Coley: “Because I talk more than anyone in my family.” 
3. I gave Anya, eighteen-months old, a blue M&M—something she’d asked for. A few minutes later, she walked up to ask for another M&M—and her face was covered with blue, as was her right hand. Completely covered with blue. There was no chocolate anywhere, just blue. I guess she licks off the outside before eating the inside. I didn’t know a person could do that: lick off the outside and spread so much of it and not get to any of the chocolate smeared along. Now, she’s just a little girl, but that’s was a lot of blue, so how thick is that outer covering??? Then a more disturbing thing: when I tried to wash her off, the blue was a stain! What is in those candies????

Sunshine and Shadow

A colleague was in my office this morning, upset over an email she'd received from a student who had misunderstood something said in class. The students' response was totally out of proportion to the level of misunderstanding (and probably reflected more about other things in her life than the misunderstanding in class). In the email, the student called my colleague--a gentle person--a monster and other bad names. As I commiserated with my colleague, I kept thinking that this kind of behavior is so common today, especially when people can write things on a computer, hit "send," and not think anymore about it. Just before my colleague entered my office, I had read of an incident where a woman loaned another woman $20, supposedly for necessities, found out the money was spent another way, and posted a rude comment on Facebook. The argument--public because it continued and escalated on Facebook--ended with one of the women dead, murdered by the other one! So I had the thought in my mind that we live in a world where people connect, but don't really connect, through the digital world. Where unkindness is easier with distance. Shadows.
After my colleague left my office, I turned to my computer screen and opened the next thing in my RSS feed: this SOLS from Ruth: http://twowritingteachers.wordpress.com/2011/03/04/dessert-club-ruths-sols/ Ruth's candid expressions of how hard it is to make relationships that end (in different ways) and then choose to develop more such relationships moved me. My perspective shifted; clouds parted. The world isn't so bleak as it had seemed just moments earlier. Yes, Ruth's relationships with those teenagers were face-to-face. But her influence on me was through the digital world. She gave me a little piece of sunshine to carry around inside today. A much better way to travel the world.

March 3: a rain shower deserves a brownie

On my way to work, I got caught outside in a rain shower after an appointment. The shower only lasted about two minutes--essentially the whole time I was running between the building and my car. At first, I thought it would be nothing much. A sprinkle. A few drops. Certainly it wouldn't ruin my hair. I was wrong. After the first few drops, it was like someone tipped a bucket of water on me. I ran to the car and jumped inside. Of course, one swipe of the windshield wipers and the rain stopped. My hair was so wet it was dripping. Great. I went to work, dried and tried to fluff my hair. This is just not a good look for me. When my husband came to pick me up for lunch, he looked at me a moment and said, "I think you need a haircut." Great. When he asked where I wanted to go for lunch, I said, "Kneaders. I need a brownie." So! Doesn't a good soaking and a bad hair day deserve a cream cheese brownie--sweet but not too sweet, chewy, and chocolate? Yes.

March 2 (even though it's March 3)

I wrote this yesterday, but I didn't have access to my blog. Here it is, even though it's posting on 3/3:
On the way to class today I saw a girl with the most unusual hair style I’ve seen in a while, especially in our hallways. I don’t know if I have the words to describe it adequately. On the left side of her head, the hair looked like what I might normally see: dark brown, straight, cut at an angle so that it was chin length in the front and longer—to her shoulders below her ears. But on the left side, the hair was straight up, like a stiff wave. Like the wind had blown it up and by some magical power, it stayed that way. In places the stand-up hair was 8 inches high! The issue for me isn’t the hair; it’s what I’m supposed to do in response to it. Should I stare? Should I look past her as though nothing is unusual? Should I gasp? Does she wear her hair in such an attention-getting way so that I will pay attention? say something? look shocked? Did my (what I considered) sophisticated response (acting like nothing could shock me) ignore her need for attention? Or was it an accident that she hoped would look better and then was glad no one reacted? Did she do it as some sort of social research project: do something weird and see what people do in response? Did I ruin her study? What IS the appropriate response in these situations?

march 1

We visited some friends we've known for over 20 years last night. The husband recently went through surgery and has been dealing with a long, difficult recovery. We went with hot soup and homemade bread, and sat for a few hours, chatting, reminiscing, catching up. Our friend stayed in his recliner, decked out in a dark blue robe and tucked in with a warm blanket. He seemed in good spirits--and I saw hints of the witty, wise-cracking guy he used to be. Not many, but a few. His wife was as gracious as ever, but she was tired. I could see that caring for him--including some specific care every few hours, night and day, and multiple trips to the ICU and regular hospital rooms and doctors' offices over the last few months--has been wearing. Their home boasts a wide bank of windows that reflect the mountains to the east in the lake below. We sat and talked and watched as the sun set behind us and the city across the lake slowly lit up, like stars on the ground. It was a warm place to be, in so many ways, and made me think about friends and shared experiences and the fragility of living. The light faded from the sky as we watched, and the lights came on as we watched, and there was nothing we could do, any of us, to make it any different.