addendum to "of course"

A few hours after the aforementioned email message, Sis3 sent me an email expressing her thanks for going above and beyond to provide a homey, generous setting for our family Christmas gathering. She also expressed gratitude for the gifts we gave her. I suspect that if I could check my husband's "sent" email, I'd find one to her, sent shortly after her first email arrived. Maybe not, but the possibility is strong.

Yesterday was one of those days containing several appointments, one after the other, and they each turned out to be positive in some way. The cable guy showed up on time and left us a new cable/dvr box, and he gave me instructions for what I can try if the problem we've had recurs. At this point, 24 hours later, the problem with the audio has not recurred, so we're very happy about that. Next, the financial planner revealed that we are better off in our investments than many others through this financial instability, and we may turn out okay by the end of 12-18 months. (Of course he's going to say that, but his track record on such predictions is good, so I'm optimistic.) Finally, at the projected 5-hour meeting of the Tech Council (which lasted about 4.5 hours), Josh the tech/data guy informed us of what computers exist in the school district, including platform, age, location, and level of software installed so we could begin to make recommendations to the IT director about how to proceed. The only unfortunate part was the attack on the superintendent by one townsperson who had demanded information back in April and who felt that he'd been ignored, denied information, and then given only part of it which he was able to decode (because of his clever professional skills) and find that some information had been left out. This guy, a former student whose son was also a complaining student of mine a couple of years ago, has made noise in the district for a while, but now that he's on a committee of folks who have as much or more expertise than he does and data to back it up, his ability to toss around computer jargon doesn't balance out his inadequate view of the big picture. I hope for all concerned that he's now satisfied that no one is hiding anything, and that he can't expect as a private citizen to micromanage the software and hardware choices, location, and purchases made throughout the school district. The overall accomplishment of the meeting was to recommend that the current IT director research what other nearby and similar schools use for software to accomplish state standards and course requirements, and to approach various vendors with "wish lists" of warranty, loaner/replacement, and hardware requests for possible extended contracts so we can get some very much needed laptops into the high school ASAP. (laptops in a cart can be moved to classrooms and shared among classes which is more efficient use of technology and means less need for space required for a lab of desktops) Hooray! We did take a light dinner break, ordering pizzas from a fairly new seafood and pizza place in town, and the pleasant surprise for me was that their veggie pizza includes sizable chunks of artichoke hearts. Yum! This one's worth ordering again sometime.

The Emergency Weather email system just sent the winter weather advisory message that we're in for some snow, 5 inches or more, and that the wind will pick up, making driving hazardous tonight. Hmmmm. Our tentative plans were to go to the movies to see "Marley and Me" because the mister loved the book and then go out to dinner (or vice versa, depending on our mood), and then back home to watch the New Year's Rockin' Eve on tv as the ball in Times Square falls. It may still happen since my husband has his honkin' big truck and he adores bulling around in bad weather. More on that soon.

of course

After hosting my whole New England family and their significant others, feeding them tasty food, catering to their needs, and cleaning up after them, I've received one email from Sis3 addressed to Sis2 and cc'd to me. In it, she said she was amazed that I could pull off yet another holiday gathering so well, and she felt better seeing how cluttered my house is because it always makes her feel better about hers.

Yeah.

That's the kind of thanks I look forward to from my family. I think I'll let someone else host the next 50 holiday gatherings.

Christmas II

Tomorrow (or I guess today, since it's 1 a.m. as I start writing this) my family will converge on our house for Christmas dinner and gift exchange. Ex brother in law's knee is still giving him pain and difficulty, so he asked if someone else could host this year instead of us doing the holiday at his place, and I volunteered. I've taken my time gathering the gifts and wrapping them, and now I'm waiting for the last of the baked goods to come out of the oven. Three batches of cookies, a double batch of brownies, two loaves of banana walnut bread, and a pan of banana coffee bread, all from scratch, have emerged from my kitchen. For some reason the shortbread didn't come out right, so they may have to do without it this year. I didn't make chocolate chip or sugar cookies but I may make a tray or two in the morning. On the other hand, I think we have enough sweet stuff between my homemade goodies and the boxes of chocolates and other confections that are sure to appear.

My intention is to keep the meal low key by calling it a hot buffet and having the food set out around the kitchen. Then people can nibble or feast at their whim. My mother may expect to sit at a dining table and be served, and if someone else wants to do that, I'll let them. By the time we're ready to eat, I'll be ready to put my feet up and relax. I'm naturally a cluttery person, so over the past few weeks the parts of the house neatened up for Thanksgiving have become hidden beneath stacks of papers, folders, catalogues, and other items of questionable importance. We've moved some furniture around to accommodate the new wide screen television, and to make better use of an overstuffed leather chair that's been sitting in a corner of the dining room. To move some pieces, others had to be removed so it's been quite a shuffling game, and in the process I've found things that've been stored away for years. My first laptop, negatives from a trip taken ages ago, ink cartridges from a printer that's long gone, sections of old newspapers that must contain articles I once thought to be of some interest but now none of them mean anything. It's funny how I hang on to things when I have no more need of them. I guess I think it's wasteful to throw such things away, preferring to find another use for them or keep them just in case they're needed. If I were better at not acquiring things I don't need in the first place, my job of decluttering would be much simpler. That's something for me to work on as a resolution. As for tomorrow, I just need to make the place presentable. I'll do that after the sun comes up. For now, the banana cake is out of the oven, so it's time to head to bed.

Sunny Christmas

Lately the weather has been unsettled more often than not, so I'm happy to be sitting here in the sun (11 a.m.) as I type. I'm wearing a new pale turquoise fluffy robe and my lovely new gold and silver bangle bracelet, chosen and given to me by my husband. He chose it all by himself, and among those of you whose spouses don't seem to have the same taste as you, you know how iffy that can be. Well, he did a great job this time. It's a little fancy so I may not wear it on a daily basis, but it's one I'll be pleased to wear often.

My spouse is out in his truck with the new super duper floor mats, wearing his new super duper jackknife with all the neato features, and trying out his new GPS. He's not usually one to be patient in trying to learn about new technology, but he seems fascinated by this one, so he may be out on the road for a few hours testing the thing. I told him I should have found one that also had a console here at home so I could watch where he is. He laughed briefly, but I know he likes being able to wander around on his own. I don't know how much he'll use the GPS but I'm glad to see he didn't just thank me for it and put it back in the box.

Yesterday was my gift to myself: a day to wander around doing nothing in particular. I need to do that more often this year because of The Troublesome Class, but taking this day to begin a nice long vacation was very sweet. I talked with a few friends, measured spaces and furniture in preparation for moving some of it around, made three necklaces and a pair of earrings, read two newspapers from front pages to last, sorted the gifts that we'll be giving on Sunday to find that I still need to make a few more purchases in the next day or two, and ate brunch in the middle of the afternoon. Ahhhhh that was a delight. :-)

Something odd happened, though. We ran out of milk so I mentioned to my husband he'd have to use some of the half & half in the refrigerator to make the mashed potatoes. For some reason, he chose to use some of the hazelnut Coffeemate. Ewwww. Here's hoping that never happens again!

p.s. (added at 7 p.m.) The GPS is a hit. He keeps checking out how far places are from where he's sitting, and he loves all those beeping noises. Boys and their toys!

A few holiday parodies

http://urbanlegends.about.com/od/historical/a/twas_the_night.htm

Enjoy!

Merry Christmas to you and your family. May you have peace and joy in this holiday season.

Just when I think I get it...

I've used Shutterfly, an online service that prints jpegs that have been uploaded into various formats, for a couple of years now, and for the most part I've been pleased. The products - a small poster of shots from my trip to Belgium, and calendars for 2008 and 2009 showing views of the area where I live - are of good quality. The colors are true and bright, the stock on which they're printed is sturdy, and the overall effect is very nice. The problem I have with this service is the complicated procedure required to place orders or re-order products.

Two steps are required to complete an order: purchase of a pre-paid plan (or putting money in the bank) and ordering particular products (charged against the money in the bank). These steps aren't clear on the web page. As a result, I've had to contact them directly to make sure that what I was doing was what I wanted to do. Well, this time I'm even less happy about having to do that. It seems that I duplicated my request to purchase a pre-paid plan, and I didn't specify which product I wanted. After about half an hour on the phone waiting and trying to understand the woman with the heavy Indian accent, I was transferred to Michael who assured me that he cancelled the duplicate request and who walked me through ordering more copies of this coming year's calendar. He also showed me a few tips about how to determine what funds I had left and how many calendars I could still order with those funds. Great! I double checked that Shutterfly had only one of my two orders documented and the amount of money left in the account was appropriately small. Good. Then I went to my bank's web page, logged in and... both charges were still listed there. As of two minutes ago, after checking four more times, I still see both amounts charged to my account. Something is rotten in the state of Shutterfly!

As of this moment, I am NOT a happy camper. I've written several emails to them with no response. I may need to channel this energy fueled by exasperation into a phone call or two or three until I get my funds back in my bank account. This is NOT the end of this story; at the same time, it IS the reminder that just when I think I get how to use the internet to my advantage, I realize how very wrong I can be.

Santa's Village

The 54th annual Santa's Village held in our neighboring town is over, and by most accounts it was a success. The community center, housed in what used to be a Methodist church, opens its lavishly decorated upper floor to the children of the community, no matter their age. The place has been made into a little village of shops surrounding a mammoth train set that runs through its mountainous loop just outside the cottage where Santa greets visitors. Each year elves (costumed upper elementary and middle school students) give to each visitor a new ornament with the year and location emblazoned on it, and photos taken with Polaroid cameras are given to families to mark the occasion. Several generations of visitors keep the tradition alive every December, and families new to the community are just as welcome as ones who have come every year for decades.

The problem with holding an event like this is the limitation that the old building has on the number of people it can safely accommodate in its upper floor. Fire exits are clearly marked, but for safety's sake, the number of people up there at any one time is restricted. Families bring their children to the basement level first to register, get name tags, have a small figure painted on their cheek if they wish, and then they move up one flight of stairs to the main level to wait. In the interim before they can mount the wide wooden staircase, kids, parents, grandparents, and friends meander through a holiday craft fair located in the wooden-floored gym. Those of us who have booths offer a variety of items for sale ranging from homemade toffee to fishing flies, from hand painted ornaments to jars filled with colorful layers of sand, from jewelry to alpaca and mohair scarves, from quilts and afghans to carved wood items and maple syrup. Some years the number of crafters has been so large that getting around the room was easy only for the quick little children who were eluding their parents' grasp, and others, the aisles were much wider and the tables much fewer. This year was, not surprisingly, the latter.

The nice thing about the Santa's Village craft fair is that once a display is set up on Friday afternoon, it can be covered each evening and left up until the event ends on Sunday evening. Officials of the community center make sure they're the last ones out before the building is locked up tight, so they provide the security. Another nice thing is the fact that the attraction upstairs draws plenty of people who have to wait their turn, so our customers are a captive audience. Still another nice thing is the reunion-type atmosphere as people who live here and those who moved away return to experience the event, and we get to visit with them, meet their children, and catch up on their lives. (Of course I'm always amazed at the ages of their kids and the amount of gray hair I'm seeing on these people who still seem in my mind to be teenagers.) The possible drawbacks are the iffy winter weather and the state of the economy, both of which had effects this year. Friday night was more sparsely attended because of the ice and power outages in parts of the area. (I haven't mentioned it yet: we had no school on Friday due to inches of sleet and ice, downed trees and power outages.) Saturday was the day of people looking more than purchasing. Sis3 joined me for part of that day to sell her magnets, but the lookers weren't the buyers. Today was the most lucrative of the three for me and for the crafters on my side of the room. Earrings, necklaces, wrist watches, covered bridge notecards, and calendars sold, and one woman asked about purchasing multiple calendars. It looks like I'll be making another order of them, and that pleases me.

Now that Santa's Village is over, I have two more sales events - to staff at work, and at a table during the Celebration of Christmas event this Thursday evening - and the seasonal gift shop as the end-of-the-year sales, and then I'm done. It's been a better season than the fairs in early October seemed to indicate it would be, and for that I'm thankful. I'm also thankful for 6.5 work days between now and vacation!

New England Weather

We're on a two-hour delayed opening for work today because it's raining instead of snowing. Monday was crazy cold and windy, Tuesday was cold and snowy (an inch or two), and today is warm and rainy, but the rain is freezing on to the very cold pavement. With luck, the parking lot won't be a skating rink by the time I get there. I'm hosting an "art attack" this afternoon which means I'll need to carry in an assortment of jewelry making tools and supplies, and I certainly don't want to slip and fall with my hands full of them. Actually, I just don't want to slip and hurt myself. Despite the confidence that yoga classes have given me, I'm still feeling more and more mortal, and I want more and more to avoid pain. My way of doing that is to be more cautious....and to avoid wearing high heels.

Since my brother in law who usually holds the Christmas gathering at his house where the kids grew up is recovering from knee surgery, it looks like we may be having my family here for Christmas, but not on Christmas Day. Both niece and nephew have other obligations on the holiday itself, so the gathering most likely will be held on one of the Sundays around Christmas. I don't mind playing hostess again, but I think this time I'll prepare all food in advance so I can actually socialize.

Behind

No, not MY behind....I AM behind!

Synopsis:

School presents new challenges each day as I can't just let my student teacher do her thing, even now in the last few days of her presence. Midterm grades need to be posted today and she still has grading left undone, despite her promises to be all caught up by Monday morning. She's good, but she's not perfect.

New male student in my wacko 4th period class, one I've been advised not to confront or engage in bargaining with, one not to turn my back on. Because there are not enough "coded" students in the class, I can't have an aide in this bunch of ADHD/repeater/low level boys.

Craft fairs continue on weekends, and I do sell enough to stay solvent. The local seasonal shop is also working to my benefit. My web page brings in a little business, so that's a good thing. I should be still in the black by the end of the year but by nowhere near as much as I was last year.

I'm still feeling restless, almost afloat. It could be that my energies feel torn between the creativity of my arts and the responsibilities of my career. Maybe this means I need to make some kind of decision or forge ahead in some particular direction. It really can't be a major change in job since I have three years of car payments ahead of me, but I'll give it some thought.

My hands have numerous small slashes and cuts in the skin from various encounters with sharp edges in the past few days. Dry skin is more susceptible to paper cuts, hands not protected with gloves suffer when they handle wood, and trying to open the back of a watch to change its battery with a small kitchen knife is not the smartest move. I shall remember these things as I now move into daily hand lotion mode.

Yesterday I loaded tables, table covers, trays and tubs of jewelry, and boxes of supplies into my Prius and headed west to the annual post-Thanksgiving craft fair held at a high school about 20 miles away from here. I didn't have to leave before dawn which pleased me, but I still encountered very little traffic on the roads. That made me wonder if I had the right day, so I was pleased to see a banner in one of the small towns that verified that the date was correct. I was still situated in the back building, something I'll try to remedy next year, but for a change that location didn't seem as much of a handicap. Usually people browse in the first building and spend their dollars there, and if they make it to the second building, it's just for curiosity's sake. Most years the time after noon is more or less dead, too, so we vendors shop among ourselves and that's not necessarily a good way to make money. This year, though, there was a pretty steady stream of customers starting about 15 minutes after the doors opened, and although there were lots of lookers - as this year of tighter finances has produced - there were still some buyers, too. Surprisingly, I sold 2 of the 4 watches I'd brought with me, and I probably could've sold a few more if I'd brought the watch faces to work on. A few eyeglasses holder necklaces sold (good useful product at a very inexpensive price) as did a small assortment of earrings, bracelets and necklaces. I surpassed my $100-in-sales threshhold by enough to call this fair a success.

For the young woman and her daughter who were set up to my right, this was only their second craft fair, so she asked for advice and to stay in touch with me to gain information about getting into area fairs. The eight year old girl is quite precocious, hawking her crocheted bracelets, mouse pins made of yarn, and paper bag puppets to anyone who passed their table. She'll make quite the entrepreneur. I expect to see them at other fairs in the next year.

My husband spent the day visiting his brother and sister who live west of here. They were both instrumental in his upbringing since he's so much younger than they are, and he feels a protectiveness of them that's endearing. We each have siblings whose lives are less stable or easy than ours are, and I think that makes us value our own circumstances even more. "There but for fortune..." as the saying goes. He came home happy from his contact with them, and that pleased me. I'm always mindful of leaving my spouse behind on craft fair days (no, he'd never dream of being tied down to an artsy place where he might get bored if he committed to helping me set up and then sitting with me at one of them) but this time he'd found something fulfilling to do, not always easy for him once he has to put the lawn tractor away for the winter!

This new large-screen tv is taking a little getting used to, partly because not all programming is digital yet so the images can look grainy and odd, and partly because the handbook with the remote isn't very clear in its explanations. I suspect it's trying to be sort of universal in its instructions and, as a result, it works well for no one. Most of the instructions seem to be for people who are not using a cable box which is something we do use, so filtering through the information and deciphering the terminology is a challenge. Once in a while some Note is actually wrong, too, so this will take a bit of trial and error to get it all working smoothly.

Bad weather is heading our way, from the west and from the south. I always fear when the forecasters predict "snow, sleet, freezing rain, rain, and a mixture" because that means we're usually in for the worst of it. Backed up against two mountains and about 150 feet higher in elevation than the towns around us, we get hit harder than most of them do. That messy mix is what they're saying is on its way, so the potential exists for a delayed opening in the morning. I wonder if our newly re-hung cable line will remain in place, the cable company will maintain its signal, and the automated alert call make its way through if we are on delay. I guess I'll know in about 16 hours!

Black Friday

Thanksgiving is over, and for once I can look back to say it was a really nice one. Ten of us gathered, noshed, caught up on our lives, tried to play my copy of "Alice's Restaurant Massacree" (a tradition) and feasted on the usual turkey dinner and pies. Sis3 brought her "new boyfriend" ... her puppy Wally, a super cute poodle/terrier mix, and he was very well behaved. My niece and her SO were here and they make such a sweet couple. I hope this is the Christmas when they become engaged. My husband's bachelor brother drove over from VT and stayed to hunt with him this morning, something they enjoy but don't often get to do together. Sis2 and her husband drove up and chauffeured Mom here, bless them. It's out of their way, but Sis2 wants to make the detour to keep the matriarch in the mix. Mom was subdued and mellow compared with years past. I thought she was going to stir up trouble when she voiced puzzlement at why Sis3 had named the pup Wally, and there was an exchange of comments, but several of us redirected the conversation to forestall any hard feelings. The last hour or so Mom slouched in my computer chair wrapped in a throw and looking very much like my grandfather did when he was apparently dozing but listening to everything and waiting to say something that would make someone cringe. That never happened here, probably because the conversations were moving too quickly. The gathering ended with people happily filling their Tupperware with leftovers to take with them, and my husband taking a break from the pots and pans washing. He's so much help cleaning up the aftermath that I'm fine with him limiting his pre-dinner chores to vacuuming, mopping the kitchen, and peeling the potatoes. I'm thankful that we all had a good day.

Today began during the dark hours before dawn as I made my way to a nearby WalMart. My goal was a particular large screen tv, but the store's allotment was gone in the first 10 minutes so I settled for another brand. I stayed long enough to pick up three things on my list and two things that weren't, both Christmas presents. The trip was fairly productive, but I doubt that I'll do Black Friday in the wee hours again. People were pushy and cold, shoving overflowing carts straight ahead and anything or anyone in their way be damned. I'll have to want something reeeeeeally badly to put myself through that again the day after Thanksgiving's glow.

In order to accommodate the new tv, our big Christmas gift to ourselves, we had to empty and move the entertainment center out of the living room and into a space in the den, and then empty and move the cabinet I've been using to hold my all-in-one printer and paper cutter from the dining room. Then we had to try to figure out how to set up the new tv. It did take a while but at least we can see our cable shows on the BIG SCREEN. I'll figure out some of the other features soon. For now I'm happy to have the furniture moved, the tv set up and giving us about double the size and much better quality picture than we've been watching for years.

I have a craft fair tomorrow morning. To my delight, I discovered that I can fit the tables and my boxes and bags and trays of jewelry and supplies into my Prius once I put the back seats down and I take out the bar with the cargo cover in it. Amazing! Now I won't have to impose upon my husband to borrow his Ford Explorer, and I'll get better gas mileage to boot. All I need now is to make some money at this craft fair, and then I'll be a very happy camper.

Thanksgiving

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving in these parts, so we'll be hosting most of my family and my husband's brother for a total of 10 at the table(s). Dinner for us is turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, peas, onions, squash, cranberry jelly, pickles, breads, and an assortment of pies.

I'm thankful for the bounty in my life, not only possessions but my dear friends. May you have a happy Thanksgiving, too!

Barcelona Red Metallic

Yes, indeed, I have my Prius! I'm getting used to its funky dashboard and controls, and its silence when it's not in motion but it's on. So far I'm getting over 42 miles per gallon...wooo hoo! I may have a chance to see how it does in snow tomorrow since some bad weather is on its way overnight. I will post a photo or two when I have a moment of daylight to take some.

The Last Night

Many people know me as Camry in several online chat places, and that won't change, but tonight (November 20) is the last night that my Toyota Camry will rest in the garage under my house. Tomorrow she'll be traded in for a brand new 2009 Toyota Prius. At least that's the plan. I haven't yet had the phone call confirming the final details about the Simonize interior and exterior finish, and that makes me a little uneasy, but it'll all work out somehow. When I do finally bring my Prius home, I'll post a picture of it here.

Thanksgiving is coming soon and my family seems to be unsettled over the holiday. Mom called yesterday to ask if it was Thanksgiving yet and would Sis2 be coming to pick her up. Since she'd called about an hour after I'd left for school, I called her back when I came home to find her confused message, and it sounded as though she'd forgotten she called. She explained to me again that she'd be glad to bring something but since her stroke (I don't know that anyone's determined that she's had one), she doesn't dare drive so she has to take the trolley that the retirement community provides to get to the store and back. (I'm relieved that she understands and accepts the fact that her driving days are over. I haven't asked if she's sold her van, not wanting to be the intermediary in that kind of process.) Of course I asked her to bring nothing but herself when she's chauffeured here by Sis2 and her husband.

Sis3 is also stressing about life in general and probably about spending time with Mom, Sis3 being sober for more than two months but living alone (except for her adorable puppy), on changing meds for depression, and on disability income that doesn't quite cover her bills. She always volunteers to make the pies and did this year too about a month ago, but recently she's asked that we not depend on her because of her mood swings, and I suspect her financial situation makes the purchase of ingredients to be a challenge. I've been thinking of checking with her to see if the new meds are working better for her, and if she'd make the pies with my ingredients so she'd have some part in the holiday that's very useful, but that would be 'depending on her' again so I haven't mentioned it. These first weeks and months beyond rehab are delicate times, and I depend on her daughter to guide my interactions with her.

Sis in law Ann is enduring her the holidays without her husband for the first time. She misses him terribly, and we all miss him too, but friends in VT and her college friends have invited her to spend weeks with them as she goes through this transition. Today she started her long and circuitous journey to visit family in the northeast and then to head southwest, eventually landing in Tucson for the winter. This is new territory for her, always having had her husband with whom to share the plans and realities, but most days she does well. This first year will be the worst, but it'll get better.

My husband's bachelor brother couldn't commit himself to coming here for the holiday when he was invited a week or so ago. I guess he's waiting for a more local invitation from one of the sisters so he doesn't have to drive too far. (This is the brother who's lived so frugally all his life that he didn't have to cash paychecks from his employer for months at a time, and who probably has enough cash stored in coffee cans to pay for several lavish trips around the world.) Me? I ordered a 22 pound bird to feed whoever shows up with lots of leftovers for them to take home and plenty for my spouse and me too. I've picked up the standard cranberry jelly, potatoes, frozen veggies, pickles, stuffing bread, potatoes, and festive tablecloths over the past month, so it's a matter of picking up the bird and a fresh apple pie next Wednesday, setting up the tables, thawing the pies that were bought locally and frozen, and preparing The Dip for our pre-dinner pleasure. I'll stuff that bird and slip it into the oven early on Thursday, and I'll enjoy the aroma all morning. I love hosting Thanksgiving!

Dangerous places

Through a colleague, I was introduced to the discount stores online. Through a friend in Vermont, I was introduced to QVC and HSN, shopping channels on cable television that also have sites online. Until very recently, those were dangerous places for me. It's WAY too easy to see something delectable, to check my bank balance, and to click that "purchase" button.

Granted, I've made some good purchases, things that I haven't been able to find locally, but now that it's November, I've had to pull my hand away from the mouse to prevent that fatal click. After all, Christmas is coming and I need to put the desired items on my list for Santa. If the past is any indication, Santa will lose the list, but putting a moratorium on pampering myself isn't a bad thing..for now.

I write this, knowing that I placed my last online order two nights ago. I dipped into my PayPal account to purchase three gorgeous silk scarves from India. My husband made me do it: he saw me admiring them on the computer screen, and he urged me to buy them. I think his ulterior motive is that he'll offer to pay for them when they arrive and call them Christmas presents because he likes to get me what I really want, but he's not a very discriminating shopper. A red plastic wallet is the same as a red leather wallet, for example, and the pretty, fuzzy slippers? Any size will fit. His heart is in the right place, but his attention to detail is packed up neatly in some long forgotten place. So if I mention that I received some lovely silk scarves for Christmas, you can recall this post and smile.

My student teacher is doing well in the smaller classes, but the larger afternoon classes, and the less focused kids are still giving her some difficulty. That's true for all of us, but she wants to try different techniques to see if any of them will work at least somewhat, and for that I commend her. She'd naturally let some of the kids babble during writing time, she admits, and she'd be looser on due dates and times, but she sees how those don't work for most kids in these classes. The next two weeks should be her best with, for her, a full class load.

We'll have between 8 and 10 here for Thanksgiving, and I'll know exactly how many when we're about to sit down to dinner. One relative on each side can't commit to attendance here, so we'll be open to them being here with us or not.

Good New$

Lately I've been whining quite a bit, so it's time to share a little good news. This weekend's NH Made Open Doors event that kicked off the holiday season was a success. Advertisement in both NH and MA helped to bring people from in- and out-of-state to visit the many small NH businesses My woodworking friend Joe, the bakery gal Garlyn, and I each had tables at her bakery, and there was a steady stream of visitors both Saturday and Sunday until noon. After that one couple, neighbors of Garlyn's out for a walk, stopped by, so we closed up a few minutes early, not feeling at all like we'd missed out on any traffic. Even with the purchase of a half price sweatshirt and a handmade wooden trivet/standing basket, I managed to come out comfortably ahead by the end of our event. It was nice to have funds to deposit in my rapidly diminishing business checking account. Fees for table space aren't high at the craft fairs I choose, but when they're added together, they form a noteworthy chunk of expense, second only to the purchase of materials. I hope these next weeks are as successful for me as this past weekend was.

Fallacy

The belief is that when a student teacher works with a seasoned teacher, that seasoned teacher can sit in the teachers' lounge, drinking coffee and reading the newspaper all day long. That assumption is made even among teaching staff. Ah, would that were so. The idea is to give the student teacher the "real" teaching experience, not to overload her and break her spirit, so although I do have a very strong teacher candidate this semester, my days are still filled with teacher obligations.

I teach four different courses, three as single sections and two sections of the fourth course. That's not a typical load. Most teachers teach two courses with multiple sections of each, and once in a while three courses. This is the third or fourth year in a row I've had this assignment, given to me because I'm a long-time teacher and my department chair (who teaches AP and honors 11th grade, two sections of each) feels I can handle it well. Most times I can because I've taught the courses many times before. However, this year includes that "class from hell" in the mix. More on that later.

All honors sophomores read The Kite Runner unless the parents will not sign the permission slip to do so. (Yes, even at high school age there are some pieces of literature that a parent here and there will consider their child too sensitive to read.) Since the book was brought into the curriculum, one student per year has had to have a separate book and curriculum running collaterally with the class's reading of The Kite Runner. It's hard enough to guide teenagers through a book assigned to them with class discussion, journal writing, assessments and films, but to run two concurrently in one class is a real challenge. Expecting Gina to run both lessons at the same time would be an abnormal load for a student teacher, so here's one of my continued obligations: take the one student who can't read TKR and work her curriculum with her.

One of the senior students in British Lit (one whose attendance for the past two years has been horrible due to anxiety, willfulness, and an encyclopedia of real and perceived medical conditions) received special permission from the Superintendent to miss two weeks of school to accompany her mother to China. The family adopted a Chinese boy, and the Chinese government finally gave the okay for them to come pick him up. Fine. As requested, we provided photocopies of the materials in the girl's textbook, asked her to bring her vocabulary workbook, gave her the lessons for the two weeks, and kept the homework web page up to date for her to access while she was away, at their request. Then came the notification that the Chinese government had presented a situation requiring a longer stay. The girl returned after more than three weeks away, having read the play that was sent with her but not having done any vocabulary work or a research paper that requires at least five citations (modern version of footnotes), and she's now a week behind (a whole unit) in the textbook because those pages weren't given to her before she left. And then, after being present for three days, she's absent again, having handed in none of the catch-up work requested of her. So today, Day 2 of parent/teacher conferences, guess who's the only appointment. It looks like this child will be my responsibility, too, while Gina keeps her focus on the class as a whole.

There's a child in one of the honors sophomore English classes who was abused when she was younger, who has lost more than 100 pounds through surgery, and who has great difficulty relating to people. She is extremely demanding while also being emotionally volatile. The girl was not recommended to this level by last year's teacher because her basic skills are poor (she was coded and used Special Education services last year but the coding was ended this year), but she wants to be a writer (oh, if I had a nickel for every student who professes that desire!) and she refuses to attend any classes taught by the other sophomore English teacher. In class she refuses to peer edit with anyone but two girls whom she sees as sympathetic to her because she's known them since first grade, and when she agrees to read her writing aloud as the class is requested to do, if the students don't all praise her or applaud, she makes snide comments. The girl was out for two and a half weeks following surgery, and despite her promises to keep up with her work which was accumulated and given to her ahead of time, she did none of it: no reading of TKR, no vocabulary, no research. Now she has gone to the director of guidance to essentially demand the same services - extra time, extra help, one-to-one tutoring - while she complains about the work level and expresses the need to stay in the honors class. Guess whose job it is to work one-to-one with this lovely child during her study hall time to try to urge her to do her work (she'll do one task on her list and then stop, saying she's tired, and then will pull out her own leisure reading book as I'm on my way out the door) and to help her study for her quizzes, even though that's her own responsibility and something that honors students typically do on their own or with a peer.

There are more (Gina didn't understand the deadline for having grades uploaded so I had to take two of her classes to give her time to do them; I still teach the class from hell, etc.), but I need to stop whining. I'm not sure why so many exceptional occurrences are happening this year, but I keep thinking next year will be better because it has to be. Then again, maybe that's a fallacy, too.

The afternoon of November 4 can't come too soon for my taste. That's when I'll finally get to vote for the presidential, gubernatorial, and senatorial candidates of my choice. I've known for a while now which of them I'd support, so the incessant advertisements, propaganda in my mailbox, phone calls, some from recorded voices, and visiting campaign supporters have become annoying, and I'll be thrilled when they stop. Two more days, two more days...

The one thing I'll miss when this election is over is the very clever political parodies of the presidential and vice presidential candidates done courtesy of Saturday Night Live. Tina Fey is the spitting image of Sarah Palin, and the other cast members (Fred Armisen as Obama, Darrel Hammond as McCain, Jason Sudeikis as Biden, Will Ferrell as Bush and Amy Poehler as Hillary and the wacky elderly woman from McCain's audience) portray the other politicos with uncanny and sometimes side-splitting accuracy. If NBC or Lorne Michaels doesn't produce a dvd of these pre election sketches, the opportunity for them to cash in on a hugely popular collection of skits and for people to own and watch them in their entirety will be shamefully lost.

Something unusual

Yesterday we saw snow flurries in the air around midday, the result of chilly winds mixed with the ends of precipitation from a departing weather front. Now, you'd think that would make the natives at my brain factory crazy wild, but no, not yesterday. For the first time this semester they were so intent on perusing the car and skateboard magazines they'd brought for SSR (silent sustained reading) that, even when someone quietly said, "Oh, there's snow in the air," they didn't lift their heads or make a comment.

Huh.

Now if I can capture that focused attention on something somewhat academic, we may get somewhere.

Just the usual

The clock moves faster than I do these days. I look at the clock and think, "Oh good, I have 20 minutes until X," and then I blink and discover that 19 minutes have flown past me without making a sound. It may almost be time for me to take a day for myself so I can break the string of days when I feel like I'm running but not quite able to catch up.

I have a great student teacher who's stronger than any other student teacher our department has had in years. Sometimes I forget that I need to ask her things like, "How's the class doing with the research papers?" or "How do you feel about how your classes are going?" She knows when to offer assistance, like getting down to first period study hall to take attendance while I'm talking with a student in the hallway, and when to step back as I read my email or have conversation with another staff member. My days are easier at school except for one thing: I still have my "class from hell" and most of my energy each day is spent on that class. It doesn't make me happy each morning to realize that's the focus of my day, not teaching my beloved Creative Writing class or conducting classes in which the conversations almost never include frequent cautions about inappropriate language or suggestions to refrain from poking each other with pens. (I keep saying this is the payback for having the luxury of teaching Canadian Studies for the past two years, and I'm annoyed when people laugh at that observation.) Granted, I've lost a few of the original miscreants, and I think this crew has made some progress since the first week of the school year (they're actually quiet for about 90% of the Silent Sustained Reading period), but they're so far behind the rest of the sophomores that I feel like we're in a different universe when I teach them. My sweet husband keeps praising my perseverance with them and he assures me that they'll get a lot more out of the class because there's plenty of structure and reasonable expectations, so I'm willing to hang in there if someone who's taught plenty of similar classes says that I'm doing a good job. Still, it's a challenge to my teacher psyche to face each day knowing I'll have direct contact only with students who are there reluctantly, and who see making others as miserable as they are as their daily goal. This too shall pass....this too shall pass....

My friend Lori and I drove an hour south of here to watch her daughter run in the final cross-country meet of her high school career. The weather held cloudy and not as chilly as predicted which made it perfect for the runners. Lori's daughter cut off a chunk of time, the whole girls' team improved their performances, and our #1 girl placed 18th, making her eligible to compete next week in the Meet of Champions. Our whole boys' team also qualified for next week's meet because they placed 3rd overall. A couple of individual runners weren't happy with their times or relative finishing positions, but they have another week and another race so they can do something about it. Lori, her daughter and I, however, celebrated the end of the season for her by going shopping at the mall. I ended up with a quilted, flannel-lined vest, a scarf and matching gloves, some hoop earrings, a cute pair of school shoes, and some Ug-like boots, a purchase I may regret. They are indeed comfortable, but they are also ugly, as the name implies. I'll wear them only in certain situations, probably when the snow is deep or the lighting dark enough that people can't see them.

I did feel useful yesterday and today as I began to renew the collaboration with a friend on the writing of a book. It's migrated a little from the first described intention of it but it's still based on a set of different perspectives of a significant event in a well-known piece of literature. It's not as in-your-face-different as the John Gardner book Grendel is as it expresses the monster's view of the Beowulf story, but it'll expand the variety of points of view from the original story which is one I've taught on numerous occasions. I offer pearls of wisdom gleaned from my own experience teaching writing and from professional writers who've revealed some of their planning techniques, and he does the writing, following the vision in his mind. I listen to his interpretation of the story and give him feedback, and he accepts and rejects it as he justifies doing it. This is his project, so the decisions are his, but we both enjoy the intellectual give and take as we discuss where the story lines are going and how best to tell them.

Let's see....which day this week will I be feeling poorly enough to stay home?

Ouch

Ten bucks. That's all I made at the last two craft fairs. That's right, two craft fairs, $5 each. The first was 4 miles from home, and it was a social event to spend time with Sis3 and see people from the area picking up their apple pies. This past Saturday was a different matter. More than a 50 mile round trip added a dent to my gasoline budget, and the extra travel time took a little larger bite out of my weekend. Although I've had a table at this fair for eight or nine years, I've made a few friendships with some of the others who also have tables on a regular basis, but otherwise I know no one there so it's not the same social event for me as the ones closer to home. A few people sold some things, but the crowds aren't as large this year, and people are more carefully considering each purchase. When the decision comes down to earrings vs. cough medicine, or a necklace vs. topping off their gas tank, the jewelry loses out much more often. I'm tempted to work on some cheaper items just to capture some business, but doing that would go against the standards I've set for myself and my products. I'll just hope that, now that gas prices seem to be dropping daily, people will feel they have a little more cash to spend on some pretty things for themselves and for gifts.

Sis3 has a new puppy, one rescued from Georgia, a 3 month old terrier/poodle mix who looks cute as a button. Just like a new mama, she's begun taking photos and sharing them with family. I'm glad she's found a new companion, one that will give her unconditional love and who will thrive on the love she'll give.

The poor Red Sox didn't make it to the World Series again this time. They just didn't have the heart that they did last year. It had nothing to do with Manny migrating to the west coast, but the difficulties that the mainstays had this season - Big Papi, Varitek and Ellsbury with their lack of hits, Lowell's hip troubles - all chipped away at their confidence. They did well to hang in there through the American League Championship Series as far as they did. In upcoming days I'll watch and hope that the Phillies win so my friend Jack will be happy, and so Tampa Bay is still left hungry for the big trophy.

My student teacher will be observed again tomorrow without any notice to me from her observer. It seems so slap-dash the way things are done. I'm supposed to fill out two lengthy evaluation sheets on my student teacher and to take part in a conference with the two of them.....but that won't be happening tomorrow because the observer has someone else to go visit right after she observes Gina. Okay. So when will we get to talk about the class that was observed? Wouldn't it make sense to discuss it on the same day? The observer told Gina that any other day would be fine...oh, but not Mondays or Wednesdays. Huh. So I guess it's Thursday? I'm just glad that Gina's doing a good job so the forms will be easy to complete, and because she's certainly not getting much support from her college so it's a good thing she's a natural and we're on the same page.

The good point for the day was looking at the price of gas on the way home to see that it had dropped 30¢ a gallon in one day. Of course that means they've been gouging us until today, and I wonder how much lower it'll go before it's truly a reasonable price representing less of a profit for the middle men, but I'll take the lower prices without complaint.

This group attended first grade together.

The reunion was fun. Despite the number of years passed, most of us recognized each other eventually, but for a few I needed to check the name tag or ask. Of course I'd studied the yearbook over the past months, but we've all matured since we were 18 years old, wearing glasses, carrying a few more pounds, or sporting gray or much less hair than we did back then.

For me, this gathering was a delight because I was able to reconnect with a part of my life that had virtually disappeared, but it had been a huge part of forming the adult that I've become. I'd attended reunions with my graduating class at the other high school, but since I'd been with them for only two years, I wasn't part of the core of the class and I couldn't related to their reminiscences of grade school, junior high, and early high school. I didn't realize how much I missed that until this reunion.

Since this was my first time back with these childhood friends, I had a lot of catching up to do, and I only scratched the surface in the 5 1/2 hours we were there at the Legion hall. Some had come from as far away as Florida and Arkansas, and - as usual - some locals chose not to attend which I think is a shame. Two of our teachers were there, one who looked younger even now than some of my classmates whom he was mistaken to be on more than one occasion. Three majorettes strutted their stuff and showed they still know how to twirl a mean baton. The gal who first contacted me was welcoming, but she was so busy making sure that everyone was having a good time that, other than standing outside with her as she had a cigarette and explained to me stories about how smoking has long been a part of her life, we didn't have a lot of time to just talk. I had enough time with some of them to find out where they lived (some not far from me now) and what they were doing, and I look forward to seeing more of them in the next year or so as we make plans for get-togethers.

I was amused to realize how many people recognized my face so easily after 42 years but that many couldn't really remember me. I wasn't one of the class stand-outs, never really making my mark in sports (I played on the intermural volleyball team) or government (I ran for Student Council secretary against Virginia Something and lost miserably) or music (I was part of the huge chorus), but I had fun building homecoming floats and trick-or-treating for UNICEF, acting a minor part in a one-act play (The Lottery) and attending football and basketball games. The fashion shows when students in home ec. class modeled the clothing we'd made, and buying vanilla cokes at Lord's Store in the center of town, and the 9 p.m. town curfew, and more came flooding back Saturday night and as I drove around town on Sunday taking photos to share with my sisters. I realized I had a pretty darn good childhood in a nice town that, in some ways, hasn't changed all that much over the years.

40

Actually that number should be 42 to reflect the number of years it's been since I last saw the people with whom I'll be spending most of this weekend. That's a long time! When I moved away from Medfield, Massachusetts in the summer of 1966, I thought people who'd been my friends would continue to communicate with me because they'd miss me so much. A few of us exchanged phone calls and then we all moved forward with our lives, and all this time I've assumed that my connection with the boys and girls - now men and women - with whom I'd gone through grade school, junior high, and two years of high school was gone except for three moldy yearbooks I had tucked away in boxes. I was wrong.

Some months ago, Gayle, one of my classmates and the host of some of our summer evening get-togethers, searched for and found me via the internet, and she let me know that I had not, indeed, been forgotten. As a result I'll be going to the MHS Class of 1968 40-year reunion this weekend. Of course I'll bring my yearbooks because that's What You Do when you attend one of these events and see your classmates for the first time in ages. Another nice thing that's occurred as the weekend has approached is the renewed communications among the classmates. Not everyone is on Classmates.com, so it's nice to be back in touch with some of the people so much a part of my first 16 years. While the ones who've shared photos do look different, the essential person I knew well so many years ago is still there, and as I'd found with the class I graduated with in Westborough, the concern for social position and all that teenage stuff is dead and gone.

I'll be going to a local craft fair Saturday morning and spending a little time with Sis3 who'll keep me company there. Then I'm off to Medfield. Dinner and reminiscing Saturday night and brunch with the ones who care to join us Sunday morning will be fascinating experiences. (Yes, the camera will travel with me, so some photos in this space may appear early next week.)

going through a phase...

This is one of those times when I'm in a little slump. I ache because I'm out of shape and yoga is reminding me how much. The bags and dark smudges under my eyes from being tired aren't very flattering so I feel homely. Friends are busy and family seems distant, although I admit that's a good thing in some ways. The clock moves a little faster than I'd like....except during my 4th period class. I can't figure out why the 7-port hub that connects my printers and external hard drive to my computer is suddenly balky at unpredictable times...but usually when I'm short on time and I need to print something. The fall foliage calls out to have its picture taken, but my free time doesn't seem to coincide with decent light so I'm losing enthusiasm for the task. I'll just keep putting one foot in front of the other until this gray area slips away and I'm back to my sunny self.

Weather report

Today's forecast for our area: sunny, no wind, 60º
Today's weather: mostly cloudy, windy, 52º

This matters because I was instrumental in locating today's craft fair outdoors rather than in a gym based on the weather forecast, and no one was happy about us being outdoors.

Yes, I know that weather forecasting is an imprecise science, and it's only a best guess about what weather will actually occur, so I should have known better than to bank on the meteorologist's predictions. Instead, nineteen crafters (including me) sat outdoors along the edge of a soccer field that served as the finishing chute for a marathon and suffered in the very breezy, chilly conditions. Believe me, I was sufferering as much as anyone. Three hours after I packed up my jewelry, table covers, tables and tent and headed home, I finally began to feel truly warm. The decision has already been made to hold next year's fair in a nearby school gymnasium and to step up the advertising so people will know we're there. That was the main problem in previous years when we'd set up in the gym: the number of customers was minimal. Other concerns, like 1/3 of the vendors selling jewelry and vendors near the doorways being cold, pale in comparison to the advertising of the event not being effective. Despite ads in local freebie newspapers, on the radio and the local cable channel, in front of the school and in the town square, people "stumbled on" the craft fair, and that's not good enough. I'm now on the committee that runs this craft fair, so I take it as my job to try to solve this problem, even without a budget. At least I have some months before I have to put any plans into action.

There was good news today: I sold well over my "it was an okay day" point, and I handed out half a dozen cards to people who expressed interest in visiting my shop. Of course that means I can't neglect to open the shop on Sunday now, but that's what I'm supposed to be doing anyway, so it's all good.

My AirPort Extreme came in on Friday, and after some scrambling to get it from the post office and some puzzlement in setting up the software, it works like a charm. The previously weak and inconsistent wireless signal out to the shop has become a nice strong three bars out of four, so I can work out there in the company of the internet and all it brings to me. Tomorrow I'll be able to do the two restringing jobs that my cold hands weren't able to accomplish today in the company of some of my online pals who check in on Sunday afternoons. Sweet!

And one more piece of good news: Sis3 is home. I'll call her tomorrow to reconnect.

Paying It Forward

There's a movie starring Helen Hunt, Kevin Spacey, and Haley Joel Osment (of "Sixth Sense" fame) entitled "Pay It Forward" in which a teacher challenges his students to do something nice (pay forward, not pay back) for three people who then will each feel the urge to do nice things for three people, and so on. My difficult class watched the film because its message is related to a book they were reading. I wasn't sure if this immature, self-absorbed, lazy bunch of teenagers would really get the message when I chose to show it to them, but I have to admit they surprised me. I'd prepared for the day following the movie by buying stems of mini carnations enough that they each had one to give intact or to separate the flowers to give more, printing small thank-you cards on my home printer, and bringing crayons, markers, and decorative edge scissors so they could embellish the cards. They were to think of some adult (which I defined for them as teacher, administrator, aide, custodian, kitchen worker, etc. and not a student) who deserved thanks or recognition, write to them in the card explaining what they'd done to earn this recognition, and then they were to deliver it to that person.

Of course there were glitches in the plan. Some of the kids are so clumsy with scissors that they cut poorly and thought that gave them the right to throw away their card and take another one; however, since I'd made extras, it wasn't a horrendous deal. Two overweight boys who hang around together because they suffer the same kind of discrimination plucked flowers off the stems to give to each other to wear behind their ears, clearly demonstrating a refusal to follow directions; since they'd also given a blossom off the stem to an adult, they felt that was enough to cover their butts. Three of the kids wandered off and circled the building a few times before being found and asked to return. Two teachers apparently vanish during 4th period because we couldn't find them to deliver the flowers, so they received theirs later. Two students were absent from class so they'll be paying it forward today instead which will cause a little uproar. So what else is new with that class, I ask.

But the heartening thing is that there was no hesitation whatsoever in wanting to participate in this project. Every one of the students in the class immediately had an adult in mind, and several had more than one right away, whom they thought were most deserving of thanks. They asked about correct spelling and somehow altered the plain cards that I'd provided to personalize them. And they were so proud and pleased when they were able to (eventually) deliver them and see the response of the recipient. When they revealed to me (and the class) who received their flowers, some students were asked why that person deserved thanks, and each giver could easily articulate sound reasons why they were deserving. Perhaps the kids in the class now have a little more expanded view of those recipients, and that's a fine thing in an environment where some of the kids say and feel that lots of people (mostly adults) are "against them."

Some of the kids said, "We should do this more often," and a few of them extended that idea to, "yeah, bring in more flowers/chocolates/gifts tomorrow" as though those items cost nothing (because to them there had been no financial cost for the flowers and cards), but instead I've challenged them for seven days to pay it forward at least once a day, in or out of school, and to write about it in their journals. My guess is that about a third of them will do it each of the seven days, a third will do it for four or five days, and the rest maybe once or twice. Even if I'm right about these students, I'll feel the project a success anyway because I've made them think about other people, recognize those people's efforts on their behalf, and see how much their small kindness in return means to them.

Lovely, rainy Saturday

The usual hope is for good weather over a weekend. Today, I'm glad it's raining. My day is more laid back when the rain is falling so I need no excuse to keep my nightgown and robe on longer than usual, one of my little sinful pleasures. Today has been exceptionally quiet so I didn't dress until almost noon, and then it was to head to my shop to make some necklaces for the bakery gal's shop. I deserve a day like this, and I'll tell you why.

Having a student teacher brings clarity to my job as high school English teacher. Her presence - like the catalyst in science or in literature - causes me to react sooner and yet with more thought to situations that arise on a daily basis. I know I have to do things correctly...by the book, so to speak...to maintain fairness which is part of my identity as a teacher, but this year I find myself going one step further to make sure that what happens as a result of my actions is what "the book" says will happen. Usually I can do this on my lunch break or during my prep period, but not this year. "Lunch" is at 10:35 a.m. and that's when I have to gear up for my ->difficult<- class, making sure that there are at least three different parts to the class and that I have enough copies of anything needed. What's supposed to be my prep period is consumed with conversation between the two of us about what to cover, how much time it'll probably take, ways to assess student understanding of material, etc. She still observes most of my classes as she sits in the back of the classroom writing her daily reflections and marking the papers from the one class of mine that she teaches. That leaves after school to do my follow-ups, if I don't have a meeting of some sort. Lately I've had some extra following up to do because of a few students in The Class, and Friday it finally came to a head. I'd submitted write-ups and provided photocopies of inappropriate work, I'd sent the kid out of class when he refused to remove the boxing gloves he chose to wear in class ("My hands are cold and I have no other gloves") and then he used profanity and made sure I heard it, and I expected administration to handle the situation. To me, it's been important to establish some degree of control because my student teacher is apprehensive about taking over this class. Well, it didn't happen as it was supposed to, so I ended up essentially on the warpath for an hour after school. How can I expect to hand over The Class - along with the other four classes that run well - to my student teacher unless I know she has a chance of surviving with the support of the administration?

Gina and I have hammered out her schedule until Dec. 11, her last day, so we know when her four-week solo period with full days of classes will happen. I do realize that part of her learning is seeing things from behind the teacher desk as they really are, but I don't want her to completely lose faith in The System because there are a few gaping holes in ours. Yes, she should be aware that teachers constantly have to go with the flow and expect interruptions and curves thrown at her. But she should also have reason to trust that the rules will be supported and the atmosphere in the school will be conducive to learning for students who want to learn. That's what I'm trying to ensure, both for her and for my students. Some days I'm worn out from the effort.

I'm taking a break from worry about school until Monday morning. I have to put it away and give it a rest. One way of doing that is taking the time to enjoy the creature comforts of my life away from school. I made four necklaces today and did some sorting and organizing out in my shop. I ate an apple from the local orchard and tossed the core into the woods as I walked down the driveway. I changed the bed sheets, inhaling the scent of the sunny day when the fresh ones hung out on the line. My lunch was a whoopie pie....at noon. I finished three crossword puzzles and two cups of coffee while snuggled up on the couch under a fuzzy throw. I went out and took three more pictures of the beautifully shaped maple tree in a nearby cemetery. And I enjoyed the ticking of the clock as I responded to personal emails. As I said, this has been a lovely, rainy day.

Finding the answers

People seem to think that teachers know all the answers. Some even think that teachers hoard the answers, unwilling to share them with others until just the right combination of words or events happens along to unlock their self-storage locker space of knowledge. Not so, my friends, not so. Life holds lots of mysteries, many of which are beyond this teacher to unravel or decipher, and a few that I can actually resolve, usually with some help. That help can come in the form of another person or some written piece of wisdom, but sometimes it's a matter of time and letting the old gray cells work, and then paying attention to what they say.

One of the questions I've voiced, at least mentally, in the past few months is Why am I here rather than there? Sometimes it's a question with very specific "heres" and "theres" and at other times the terms are quite general. On the surface, the answers sometimes seem to be simple, "You signed a contract and you have a JOB, dummy!" being one of them. And sometimes I know the answer but I just don't want to acknowledge it, so that's a case of, "Grow up, darlin, and smell the coffee." But in thinking more deeply, I realize that I am - as most people are, I suspect - right where I'm supposed to be, when I'm supposed to be there. There's a reason why I was at the kitchen window a few weeks ago when the young deer were out in the yard and I had a chance to see them. There's a reason why I was in Belgium last year and why I'm here this year. There's a reason why I was in the office yesterday when a friend trying to be strong couldn't hold herself together for a few moments. Those reasons don't always become apparent right away, but eventually some of them become clear, and when they do, I feel a lightness that's hard to describe. It almost feels like I carry around the things that are unresolved like so many pebbles (or boulders, sometimes) and each time I become aware of an answer that I seek, I'm enlightened in several senses of the word: that "I get it!" light bulb over my head goes on, and the load of pebbles becomes lighter. So today, on this glorious autumn Saturday, I'll go to watch a high school football game, and I'll enjoy where I am while I'm there and be happy, knowing I'm where I'm supposed to be. And now I'll have one less point to ponder and one less pebble to carry.

A year ago...

One year ago right now I was in Belgium. Right now I sit in the glow of sunrise in central NH wishing I could have repeated the visit.

Last night a colleague, my student teacher and I went to the local university to hear Donald Hall read from his current book Unpacking Boxes and to have him sign our copies. He's mellowed a bit in recent years, having had a stroke and living alone on the family farmstead a dozen miles from my house. He's let his beard and hair grow, he's given up tweed wool jackets for a rumpled Hawaiian shirt, and his thin hands shake as he signs each book handed to him. On the other hand, he'll be 80 years old tomorrow on what the governor of our state has proclaimed to be Donald Hall Day in honor of his substantial body of work, his Poet Laureateships of both the state of NH and of the USA, and for his unending support of this state that he loves.

One of the pieces he read last night was about being stopped as he was driving just down the road from our high school one evening and being arrested, essentially, for Driving While Old. Get Unpacking Boxes: it'll be an amusing read.

Puzzlements

Why does the UPS tell me on its tracking page that an item will arrive promptly on a Wednesday and then attempt to deliver it on the Tuesday beforehand?

Why does a teenage girl who's sitting in her desk red faced and crying yell at me when I ask her if she's okay?

Why does an internet site work so flawlessly for others but it works like crap for me?

Why do the powers that be in our school district take in, for free tuition, a student who lives in another school district and who failed to pass 8th grade at another school and place this student in 9th grade in our high school?

Why does this large glass of white zinfandel taste like elixir from the gods?

...followed by the shortest weekend

Yes, it's a regular two-day weekend, this one that falls after the longest week of the year, but it feels like a single day. Most of those things that I'd saved to do "over the weekend" remain yet to be done so it feels as if this weekend has been about 24 hours long.

Friday evening was a lovely (and noisy) dinner at our favorite local Italian place. This has been a NASCAR weekend at a racetrack not too far from here, so the area becomes overrun with fans and participants from far and near. For the first time in more than a year we had to wait for a table, and for the first time ever the wait was more than 15 minutes. Those of you who know that my husband says he married me so he wouldn't have to wait in line for his meals (college meal lines and restaurant lines are two of his least favorite places in the world) understand how good this restaurant's food must be for him to wait willingly and even patiently for a table. He had his typical pasta and meatballs and I had my favorite veal parmigiana with linguini, my treat to thank him for making some dinners during the week when I was so tired. We each have a small carton of leftovers for lunch tomorrow. Mmmm!

On Saturday my friend Mary and I went shopping. Now that bills were paid with the first paycheck of the year, this paycheck gave me a little money to spend on updating my wardrobe, so we headed toward a local department store that was having a sale. (It seems that some chains are constantly having sales this year, probably to lure the public whose buying patterns have changed with the spike in fuel oil and gasoline prices as well as the products with higher prices.) On the way there I pumped gas for $3.39/gallon and was glad for the bargain (the local convenience store is still charging $3.61). We both commented that two years ago calling this price reasonable would have been ridiculous. Times surely do change! I did some damage to my store credit card there, but I did end up with three full bags of clothing that looks pretty darn good on me. As usual, Mary and I found some items for each other, and we each bought a brown skirt that I'm sure we'll both end up wearing on the same day. I doubt that people will notice since we work on different floors and we chose different types of tops to wear with it. We had a tasty lunch at the nearby Chili's which was very rejuvenating. At our next stop I picked up ink for one of my printers and a few other stationery items, and then we went to Wal-Mart. Their products are dependable if not luxurious, and shopping the clearance racks is always fun. Finally we did a little grocery shopping, and headed homeward, but we just had to make a quick stop at Dairy Queen. My root beer float with a shot of vanilla DQ (it's NOT ice cream) brought back memories of high school when my dad's insurance agency office was across the parking lot from a DQ and one of my jobs on hot summer days was to take orders from office staff and go pick up some treats for everyone. It's probably a good thing the nearest DQ is now about 14 miles from home or I'd be in serious trouble. By the time we reached home, neither of us wanted or needed dinner but we were both happy with our day spent together in conversation and doing something different from house work and work work.

Today I slept late. It felt wonderful. Freshly made cinnamon rolls and hot coffee made the rainy morning pleasant. Then came help desk duty, finishing the laundry, and opening my shop. No one but my husband visited so I spent time trying to improve the wireless internet connection from the house to the shop. I had no success so there's more to investigate. I did manage to make a wearable bracelet out of silver wire after several attempts. There's so much more I want to try.

The longest week of the year

In real terms, it's simply a five-day work week, but after almost eight weeks in which I was the boss of my time and when I hung out with the people I chose, this first full week of school feels like a grueling endurance test. Things I've had to get used to: lunch at 10:35 a.m.; moving to a different room for six of the seven daily class periods; spending time when I would be working, planning or correcting in conversation with my student teacher; having to carry and use my personal laptop to try to find locations near my first period class where the wireless network signal works to take attendance each morning; a class in which more than half are repeaters; a student in an honors class so emotionally needy that she makes audible, disparaging comments if the other students don't applaud her work as loudly as (or even louder than) they do other students' work; bringing a cup of yogurt daily for lunch during my prep period (12:30 - 1:10) because that's all my stomach can handle. That last one will change as I adapt to this very different year, especially on days when the cafeteria offers chicken patty sandwiches, spaghetti, french bread pizza, and their turkey dinners.

I mentioned my student teacher, Gina. She's actually very good, much more mature than "Junior" (my previous student teacher a few years ago) was, and quite independent in many ways. Although she was concerned about classroom management, she was running my British Lit class well by Day 3...but I have to admit it's a class of 8 seniors who have almost no behavior issues. However, she is bonding with them and that's an excellent start. She's still learning about pacing during class time and in planning, about the logical order of things, and about different learning styles which is a subject that I assumed was still covered in education classes at the local university, the same one I attended for both of my degrees. It's not. That floored me. I ended up giving Gina a quick mini-lesson on different "modalities" or ways in which people take in and learn information by using myself as an example: visual/spatial memory, auditory intake of information, tactile/kinesthetic task learner, visual curiosity and attention to detail. That should help her to understand why we vary types and styles of assessments (tests, quizzes, homework, projects, etc.) and why we have to present the information - curriculum and assignments - in so many different ways, trying to offer it so that the widest variety of learning styles can grasp it. She's a fast learner so I'm confident she'll pick it up quickly.

Sis3 has had some health issues, so with the help of her kids, she's getting treatment for them. She started this past Monday, and it may take some time, but I know she's being well taken care of, and that's a great relief.

The tendinitis in my arm that's bothered me for a couple of months is starting to respond to ibuprofen to bring down internal swelling. The pain is less and my grip is getting stronger. I thought I was able to stop taking it so I backed off a few days ago, but with the lifting and carrying at school and the work with jewelry making tools, I'm not quite there yet so I'm back to four-times-a-day doses. An unexpected side benefit has been that what seemed like a knot in a muscle under my right shoulder blade seems to have disappeared, and I suspect it was also a tendon that was somehow aggravated. Less pain and discomfort is A Very Good Thing.

September is, I'm happy to say, the month with the fewest craft fairs. It's the time after the summer season to take a breath and begin to make more product for the fall and pre-Christmas times. I need to print more two-sided business cards - one for the jewelry me and one for the shop - to hand out to people. I ran out of both at my reunion, so it's time to get printing again.

Once the dust settles after a significant performance by a friend and his band on September 21, I may be helping this friend write more of a book that was started about a year ago. The collaboration began not long after he had the idea to write it because I know fairly well the original piece of literature from which this story flows. We work well together, ideas flying and flowing, sometimes when we adopt the personas of the main characters, sometimes in almost an interview format, and sometimes in straight discussion. He's the one with the vision, and I'm the one who helps him to flesh it out. I'm very much looking forward to resuming the process.

Today my friend Mary and I will go shopping. Her husband is hunting and my husband is at a cross country meet, so it's just us girls wandering around. I'm not sure where we'll go, I do have a few items I'd like to find but if it doesn't happen...oh well, and it'll be a fine day.We're nearly the same size, and we know each other's taste in clothing, so we're forever finding something and handing it off to the other one to try on. She's such an easy person to spend time with and she seems so capable of handling anything that life throws her, but she too needs time like this to let her hair down and know that our conversations in the car and over lunch go no farther.

Reunion part 1

Saturday night was the reunion of the people with whom I'd graduated from high school in central Massachusetts. After 40 years, some of us look more or less the same and some people...well, they're jaw-droppingly different. I didn't even recognize one of the guys I used to have a wicked crush on because of his thick wavy gray (not red) hair, thick glasses, and paunch. We all have more seasoned skin and most carry a few more pounds. More noticeable than the difference in appearance, though, was the absence of the social barriers that used to exist. People who hardly gave me the time of day back in high school were calling me by name and engaging me in conversation, genuinely glad to see me. We spent a few hours enjoying delicious barbecued skewers of chicken and marinated beef, salads and rolls, and friendly talk. Almost half of us in attendance are somehow involved in education, and several of us exchanged business cards related to our second creative careers. Even my spouse enjoyed himself, being recognized by a few of the men who have attended these gatherings each time and getting to know some of the others as they stood on the sun porch "guarding" the beverage coolers.

Our hosts were a classmate of mine and one of Sis2's who had married not long after my husband and I did. After living out of town for quite a few years, they were able to purchase a big square old farm house a couple of miles from the town center and renovate its interior extensively, making it into a lovely home. The original plan was to have the event catered and for us to use their porch, deck and back yard, but since Hurricane Hanna was determined to join us, we used their tv room, dining room, kitchen and sun room, and a few wandered out onto the deck in the drizzle (at that point) to cool off as the rooms indoors became warm despite air conditioning. The caterer set up the barbecue grills under shelter outdoors so the whole neighborhood could enjoy the aromas and our hosts didn't have to scramble to find cooking space indoors. The couple kept as much of the old original house as they could, jacking up floors and squaring walls and doorways, using replica wallpaper close to the original, and decorating walls with original antique maps and signs found in this and their previous home. Heather had found a box of pieces of stained glass collected by Mark's mother who used to make lamps and suncatchers, and she commissioned a local woman to use some of the rescued glass in some new lampshades with local flowers and pine cones in the patterns. We thanked them several times for opening up their home to us until finally Mark admitted that he had one huge advantage over the rest of us: when the party was over, he didn't have to drive anywhere to find his bed! I figure that's why he concocted a bowl full of evilly pink Hurricane Hanna Punch for us which I sampled, but it tasted like it might do my liver more damage than the actual storm would so I left it alone after a couple of sips and stuck to wine.

Two of the people present were from my old neighborhood off East Main Street, and I hadn't seen either of them in many years. Nancy has five children and is fairly recently divorced, and Larry oversees housing at Harvard and shares his off duty time with his significant other. Both of them are still very much the same friendly people but comfortable in their lives now, and I hope we can stay in touch. Really. Mark had provided a spreadsheet where we filled in our contact information, and the hope is that he'll share that with all of us soon. Speaking of sharing, after I download the photos that my spouse graciously took of the group, I'll post one here. It'll be amusing, I promise.

Not amusing at all was the drive home. Rain that had been light but constant had become much heavier, and the wind had picked up some by the time we decided to head north. Several people had difficulty trying to drive up the slick wet incline of the back part of the yard, so they'd be waiting a while. We had parked in the front row, and driving carefully we'd been able to drive out smoothly. (I cringe to think how ugly their back lawn was today.) Between the wind, the dark, the changed highway exit numbers, the added stoplights, and the driving rain, my husband had a difficult task in getting us home safely, and it did take an extra half hour, but we made it in one piece. I think I was asleep about 2 minutes after my head hit the pillow: it takes a lot of energy to grip an arm rest with each hand and to simulate pressing gas pedal and brake with both feet for a 2.5 hour drive! The dry, sunny weather today was most welcome.

Happy Hot Friday

90º is what the temperature gauge on my car dashboard glowed at me when I started the trek homeward this afternoon. Even opening windows as soon as I arrived and turning on fans in the classrooms didn't help much today. The humidity made the sunny day even more oppressive, both in and out of the school building. As one student put it, why couldn't we have had this weather back in July when we could have enjoyed it?

On the other hand I suspect we'll be wishing for some of this heat during the cold months ahead. We nearly filled our oil tank and will have it topped off when our next paycheck arrives. Because we do have a wood stove and a good supply of wood, and we've learned to wear layers when we're at home, and our house faces south with some large windows and skylights, we'll be better off than many who aren't as fortunate in their ability to heat their houses or keep themselves warm.

As this second week of school ends, I'm making some discoveries about some of my students: one of the goofiest sophomores is also the most thoughtful and articulate; another of my sophomores misspelled her name on her vocabulary quiz; yet another sophomore who began the year with me and was withdrawn from school two days ago will be rejoining us...something about her father getting out of jail; one of my senior creative writing students is poised to "come out" to the class about her sexual orientation; two boys in my low level sophomore class come from home lives where it's fine to call people names or harass them if they follow a different religion or dress differently than they do; the girl with the blue hair provides kind and wonderfully constructive feedback to her peers when they read their writing; one senior boy aspires to be a writer of poems that he'll be proud to show his grandfather who is a poet; one of the best, most observant students in my British Lit class is the daughter of a former student who was so lazy he wouldn't move to get out of his own way; three of my sophomores share the same probation officer; and a senior girl is on the brink of an acting/modeling career as soon as she has her diploma in hand. Diverse and interesting bunch, eh?

Tomorrow night I'll be attending my 40th high school graduation reunion down in Massachusetts. I felt foolish asking for directions to a house where I spent hours making prom decorations, but after all it HAS been 41 years since those gatherings. These folks are the ones I've seen every ten years, intended to keep in touch with, and then ... life gets busy. I'll bring my husband because he's accompanied me to most of the previous ones, and he knows a few people. It's likely that the ones who, in high school, hung out together in their little cliques will still sit in corners and talk among themselves, and the rest of us relative nobodies will enjoy the evening. I opted not to stay overnight at a hotel or go to the brunch the next morning: short and sweet is best, I think. Besides, I have another reunion to attend in about a month, and that one should be much more emotional for me. I haven't seen those classmates since 1966 when my family moved 35 miles away, so I wonder how many I'll recognize. Seeing some of their faces (of the ones who dare to post current photos there) on Classmates.com has been reassuring and amusing. A few of the boys I had wicked crushes on ... well, I'm not sure I'd have recognized them today if I met them on the street. I suspect that the women will be easier to identify, but I'd better be bringing my yearbook with me just in case!

This was a true four-day school week, not 3.5 as last week was. I felt lighter at two separate times today: once when that challenging 4th period class was over, and once when the last students left my classroom at the end of the day. Liberation! This glass of wine tastes extra good this afternoon. Cheers!

Back in the saddle

In some ways it's like I've hardly been away from this place I lovingly call the Brain Factory. Many student faces are different, the order of events has changed and a new one was added, and I've gained a temporary but long-term appendage (my student teacher), but otherwise it's all the same. Pizza on the first day of the week, snafus with class lists, senior passes and attendance, kids being sent to the office, lines of impatient teachers at the photocopiers, yoga classes on Wednesday afternoons, and two window fans in each classroom making the interior temperature just bearable are the normal fabric of the days. The new librarian has a lot of learning ahead of her but she's trying to catch up. The same goes for the elementary art teacher who took over the Intro to Art classes when his position was eliminated: the learning curve will be steep. Neither one of them has a lot of experience among that high school crowd. With luck they won't be eaten alive.

The weather is turning fallish with chilly nights and beautiful sunny days. It's a challenge to ignore the lovely weather when I need to be indoors teaching mindfully. However, I figure it's our reward for the nasty rainy summer we had. The timing could've been better, though. Why not give it to us during the month of July?

My youngest sister is having some medical difficulties, but I'm pleased to find that her kids are becoming involved and helping her find her way through. Even a couple of years ago I wouldn't have thought it possible. My niece and nephew are good people but they didn't seem capable of taking care of someone else, including their mother. It's so nice to discover that they've grown up and are taking charge. Her treatments will take some time, but I'm reassured that things are all falling into place for her, thanks in large part to her kids who are doing the research and stepping up to care for her.

My jewelry making has brought me a small but constant stream of income, something that allows me not to have to find other work during the summer to make ends meet. It also brings me people who drive up the driveway before dinnertime to ask if I can shorten a chain on a special necklace for the wife or sell them eyeglasses holders or make a bracelet for their niece's birthday. That's okay: happy customers come back and they spread the good word about me. The reputation I've established motivates people to look for me at craft fairs and to ask me to sign the back of the little card that accompanies their Lake bracelet. I'm happy that this hobby of mine has grown into something quite fulfilling for me. Besides, it keeps me out of trouble...mostly.

Speaking of trouble, I can't figure out why my husband has trouble putting ALL the food away after dinner. How hard can it be to refrigerate the left-overs AND the tub of margarine? Is it really a challenge to put the blueberry bread made by his sister in law into a plastic container instead of letting it sit in crumpled pieces of aluminum foil on the shelf, gathering big black ants? Who knows, maybe I'm the foolish one!

The Gang

This is the gang that gathered at a restaurant in downtown Manchester, NH last Friday night:
Lil (or Camry a.k.a. me), AhClem, Short-and-Sassy, and ARB.

We four "weirdos" as ARB called us have known each other for a few years online. I met ARB and his wife for brunch in Tucson a couple of years ago while my husband and I were out there visiting his brother and sister in law. AhClem and I have met a number of times in Boston where he worked in the theatre district and when he's brought his family up to my neck of the woods for family outings. Sassy is the only one I hadn't met before offline, and she's as bubbly and vivacious as I thought her to be. She also pointed out how accurate her nickname is. Their spouses and ARB's sister and brother in law joined us, and we had a wonderful time talking, drinking, talking, eating, and talking.

Another and very different gang arrived today: the freshmen. This is a larger than average class (about 120) but they were pretty sane and civil during meetings in the auditorium and at lunch when some kids go wild. I'm not sure if it's just the demeanor of this group or if the Bridge sessions held in the summer helped tremendously. Either way, it was a good day. Tomorrow they get the day off and the upper classmen return. That's when my year will really begin. Today I spent time getting my student teacher oriented and answering some of her questions. She's a note maker and question asker, a habit that I see as an excellent sign. She wants to jump right in, but I won't let her bite off more than she can chew. Right now she feels a sense of accomplishment in seeing the big picture regarding British Literature, and that's fine, but there are three more course outlines to attack. I'll let her slip into the stream of World Lit once she's wet her toes with the seniors.

A few moments of quiet

Wednesday through Saturday have been on-the-go days, so now while I sit alone in my online community help desk, I have a little quiet time to catch up here.

Wednesday and Thursday were days of meetings when teachers and sometimes support staff (office, kitchen, custodial, paraprofessional and special education aides) sit and watch or listen to administrators who have attended some kind of new training over the summer proclaim the excellence of it all and explain that this is the new focus of the agenda for the year. This year it seems to be data: we have lots of data but we don't use it to our advantage, so that's what we'll need to do this year. I guess there are some folks who are excited about that. To me it means another task added to what we already do but without more time to do it. Time and payment are two issues in short supply, so when either of them is being manipulated by someone else, it makes me a little nervous.

The positive side of that is that our building admins did take the data fed back to them via a survey and they say they intend to make some notable changes that should allow teachers to feel that they're back in control of their classes and the academic wings of the building. Last year we had a few nasty students who were disruptive, uncivil, uncooperative, and even threatening who, for reasons teachers weren't allowed to know, were kept in school, ruining the atmosphere and taking inordinate amounts of time and attention that should have been spent on the students who wanted to participate and learn. (One of them was made to stay in a class next door to my study hall, and each day I thanked my lucky stars that he wasn't assigned to me. I could hear the kid as he regularly swore loudly, destroyed items in the classroom, defaced property, refused to do his work or take tests, belittled other students, and threatened the teacher before walking noisily out of the classroom to wander who knows where.) The discipline system is supposed to be tighter this year, and some of the angry, disruptive ones will be taking at least some of their classes in isolation via a Distance Learning program, supervised by one of the special needs staff. It's a good start. We'll see how long the plan lasts.

Both days my student teacher absorbed it all, and at the end of a viewing of a film by Dan Habib about inclusion of special education students into mainstream classes, she asked, "Did they show that to us because the school doesn't do that? Will that be a new thing for us?" I just shook my head and told her that we've been using inclusion for at least the 20 years we've been in the current building, so I wasn't sure why we were shown the film other than the fact that the people showing us probably went to a workshop over the summer and were given the film to share with coworkers. It's good to be reminded of the impact of our open-arms policies on kids who can thrive as a result of them, but to show us an hour-long film in a warm dark room after lunch on a day with gorgeous weather is poor planning. Most of us could have used the time to better advantage, setting up classrooms and collaborating on new courses that we're teaching.

Friday we worked in our classrooms, and since I'll be teaching in two different locations this year, I spent some time in the other classroom making it a kind of home away from home. I've had a study hall in there, and a very small class of mine met there three years ago, so it's not unknown to me, but I'll need to move quite a few resources to the room, ones that supplement the textbook and give us a wider view of British Lit. Of course my set-up time was interrupted now and then by the needs of others ("Does your laptop get the wireless signal from the library so you can take attendance in the cafeteria each morning?" "I gave you the teacher workbook for this series, right? Do you mind if I take it over the weekend?" "Do you have enough grade 12 vocab workbooks? I don't.") and by a meeting to figure out which interactive computer course would be more equivalent to ones we teach, so by the end of the day I was glad to get out of there. The highlight of my day was yet to come.

After taking a shower, changing my clothes and catching my breath, I headed an hour south to meet some friends for dinner. Known as ARB, Short-and-Sassy, Ah-Clem, and Lil, the four of us have been internet chat pals for years, and while ARB was in the general vicinity (he and his wife live in AZ), we decided to get together. I'd met ARB and Mrs. ARB for brunch in Tucson a few years ago, and Ah Clem and I have hung out together in Boston (theater stuff) and up here (craft fair stuff), sometimes with his wife and son, numerous times. ARB brought his sister and brother in law, and Short-and-Sassy brought her husband, and the nine of us had a wonderful time catching up and talking about everything from birthday parties and politics to the Red Sox and the Olympics. Half of us are or have been teachers so of course we talked shop, but not for long. The Italian restaurant that "Sassy" chose served us delicious food, and we never felt rushed by the waitstaff, so the three hours flew by. As in the past, I found that Sassy was, offline, exactly what I knew online, something that more often than not happens. Once in a while online friends are somehow different - taller, having unusual gestures or ways of walking, lighter or heavier, laughing in unexpected ways - and that can be interesting, but mostly we're just what we present ourselves to be, and that makes gatherings like this one very comfortable right from the start.

Saturday was the Old Home Day craft fair that was so complicated to enter. Before it began I headed to the nearest Staples store since it was their Teacher Appreciation day, and I gathered up a basketful of goodies, some free and some for pennies apiece. Their gift this year was a 512MB flash drive in its own case, as many clips and oversize tacks as you could fit into a 4x6" plastic bag, and packages of pencils free to teachers. Then I dashed to the craft fair where I set up beside someone I know from many local fairs, a quilter and knitter who kept a stream of conversation going for the entire day. The day was warm and sunny, but I managed to find shade and a breeze that kept me going. As Old Home days tend to be, the event was more social than lucrative with lots of current and former friends making the rounds after the parade and the display of old cars. Some pretty good music (that is, stuff I knew and could sing and boogie to) played at a level of many decibels, and a local organization ran the lunch wagon conveniently close to my tent. I managed to sell a few things, some that I made on the spot, and I didn't fry in the sun, so it was a good day. My spouse came early to set up my tent and tables while I went to Staples, and then he had his fund raising relay with his cross-country team at the high school. He came to help me break down and pack up, but so many friends saw him and had to say hello that his help was with the final items, the tent and tables being tucked away in his Explorer. That's okay: he grilled some really good barbecued chicken and snipped a pound of string beans for dinner. My job was to gather the cucumbers and cherry tomatoes from the garden which required two trips. This is one of those bumper crop years for cherry tomatoes. I'm not sick of them yet!

Time to close down here and head out to my shop where I'll sit on the porch, the smell of freshly mowed grass in the air around me, and a little breeze keeping me cool. Customers? Probably not, but that's fine. I'll enjoy my quiet anyway.