Summer time

I keep thinking about posting, but there isn't anything particularly noteworthy going on around here these days--just writing (a lot), lots and lots and lots of board games, walks along the ocean, much time spent in libraries, etc.  I often let the kids decide what we're going to have for dinner (which means that we eat things like spaghetti and meatballs or pancakes quite often).  We read a lot.  And the kids are drawing a ton. 


We do some "special outings," of course.  One of the best was when we went to the independent (one-screen) theater in town to see three silent movies from the 1910s and 1920s, accompanied by a live orchestra (just as they would have originally been seen). 

But, mostly, it's just life, on summer schedule. 

The board games I can live with, and sometimes they are a lot of fun...but oh, that day this week when the kids came to the library with me and just hung out, reading, for over an hour...

Heaven.

What's your summer all about?

Charting Family

Yesterday, for some reason, Samuel got it in his head that he wanted to see/make family trees.  So, we did his Dad's side of the family:

....and then mine:

In case you want to see the details, I'll split that last one up:

And, yes: that's just from my grandparents through the current (outcoming) generation.  No wonder I can't stand a crowd...

What stands out on your family tree?

Catmunication

My cat, Toonces,* thinks that she has telekinetic powers.  If she stares at my hand long enough, it will surely pet her.

Usually, she's right.

*Toonces was the driving cat on Saturday Night Live in the late 1980s or early 1990s. You can probably find him on You tube (I think we found "Toonces without a Cause" there). 

July 5th

The fourth of July came and went--we didn't do any work, but it was a kind of a grey day, ending with dense fog that postponed the fireworks that Anya desperately wanted to see (having never seen them in her "whole life").

And then, magically, the next day turned out to be great. 

1) Howard let me work a little longer than usual, and I got through some really sticky parts of writing chapter 5.

2) At 3:30 I went to art class (at the library) with Anya where, because it was not at its usual time, she was the only one to turn up.  Private lesson!

3) After dinner, we went back to the library to watch the 1940 film version of "The Mask of Zorro." (with Tyrone Powers)

(Okay, it was a socio-historically incredibly inaccurate.  But, it was also a good and funny movie.)

4) Then, finally, Anya got to see the Camden fireworks. 

Needless to say, my wee girl was very, very tired when she got home after that.

When have things just "fallen into place" for you lately?

Playtime with Barbie

I think it is unlikely that my sweet, seven-year-old daughter is going to grow up to be a serial killer.  Thus, I assume that Barbie is simply fed up with making sure that her hair is perfect all the time, and she has taken up naked bungee jumping.  In fact, this gives me more hope for my child than if Barbie had to conform to her image all the time.

What a girl.  

On being a misfit

Last night, I had that dream again.  It was the first day of classes, and I had no syllabi prepared.  The class was huge (and, as usual, in a weirdly shaped room...maybe going around a corner again?  not sure).  Students began to walk out in the middle of class.

It's the professorial version of showing up to school naked.

I still wonder if I belong in the front of that classroom, even after many years and moderate success there.  I wonder about scholarship even more.  Academic life has always felt a bit...out of reach?  ill-fitting?  I recall when I was a senior in college and got a letter inviting me to go to an informational session on applying for Rhodes and other scholarships.  I had to ask someone what those were.  I never did go to the event, or apply.  I'm still baffled and overwhelmed by grant writing. 

And yet, here I am, loving the pedagogical and historiographical writing that I am doing this summer, and looking forward to the archives next spring.  Plus, I no longer have the ability to "go back" to how I grew up, to fit into my blue-collar roots.  Maybe, I think, because I never did fit in there. 

And so I continue to live betwixt and between, in this and so many other ways.

Anya's Word of the Day

Tonight, when Anya got on the phone to talk with me, she exclaimed:

"Salutations, Mum!" 

I almost died from delight.

Apparently, she picked this word up from Charlotte's Web.  (They must be reading portions of it in her class?  She wasn't too clear on that part.)

Anya has always been interested in the definitions of words. When Howard tried to push her a little too hard at age 6 to learn how to read, she looked at him and said "I don't want to learn how to read right now, Dad.  I want to learn what words mean."

What a girl.