Chronicles of Churchmanistan

The ZPD

2012-02-11T18:48:00.000-05:00

Each year of teaching I seem to manage to absorb one central insight that dramatically improves my teaching practice. My first year, I realized that having a strong, detailed, and nuanced behavior system was all well and good, but if it got in the way of building strong relationships with my students, it wasn't worth much. I realized that I wasn't using any of the tools that had made me successful in summer camp in my classroom, and in fact that was what was keeping me from being successful in the classroom.

My second year, I realized that I needed to ask my students to explain everything. Like show horses that know how to "add" by stomping their paws, students are incredibly savvy at guessing the answer the teacher wants, but if they can't explain it, they don't get it. By asking, "How?" and "Why?" with every question, I immediately increase the rigor and critical thinking in my class with zero extra work for myself.

A painful clip of a student "getting the answer" from The Wire. (The clip loses relevance after about minute 2.)

I'm not sure that I've managed to find my insight yet this year, but I'm starting to zero in on a better understanding of how students (or people in general) learn that might be getting me closer to finding that thing that will make me a better teacher this year. I find myself talking quite a bit in front of students, which is too bad, because students retain a statistically insignificant percentage of what I say. Basically, that's because the knowledge my students retain is the stuff they figure out for ourselves.

If I tell them something they already know implicitly, there's no reason for them to create a new memory, so they forget it as soon as it's said. If I tell them something they don't know at all, then that piece of information is so alien to their understanding of how the world works that there's no way to work it into the context of what they already know, and they forget it as soon as it's said. It's like me asking them to memorize a long, random series of letters and numbers and telling them it's essential to do so to pass the test. The task would seem arbitrary and meaningless to anyone, and it calls into question how important a test is that is passed with such an arbitrary set of knowledge.

The key to good teaching, then, is to work somewhere in between what my students already know and what they don't know. I recently read something that said a Soviet named Vygostky called this the Zone of Proximal Development. If I can find that ZPD for my students, then there's some hope that I will be able to guide them to create new understandings that moves their ZPD further and further up. My goal is to get students to answer questions that they haven't answered before, and the only way I can do that is to get students to think about questions that they have enough knowledge to understand, connect the pieces, and find a solution. Getting a student to think about a question that is just a tiny bit harder than one they thought could answer seems to be the key.

Therein lies the rub: I have to make students think about questions. Simply asking students questions, funnily enough, doesn't seem to particularly motivate most students to think about how they would answer them, because they absorb almost nothing of what I say. Threatening, rewarding, cajoling, begging, pleading, demanding, extorting all find some success, but mostly in the short term. It appears that I have to present my students with problems that seem engaging and solvable, and convince my students that they really are both of these things, which is difficult when they absorb close to nothing of what I say, and the last thing they want to think about is how many apples Jose needs when he buys twenty bananas. Much more interesting is the problem of how to fold a piece of paper and fling it with a rubber band without Mr. Churchman seeing.

This nicely shows how pointless it is for me to talk during class.

All this is pretty abstract, so I'm not sure it will be as fundamental to changing my teaching practice as "relationships trump behavior systems" from my first year or "get them to explain everything" from my second year. Mostly I've been thinking about how I will apply it to teaching adults over the next semester. I'm not sure I wil be able to craft problems and questions for adults that make them think and and answer questions within their ZPD. They will want and ask me to tell them what I am trying to say, and I will want them to figure it out for themselves so they actually remember it, and we may both come away from my sessions feeling unsuccessful.

Grown Ups

2012-02-04T18:08:00.002-05:00

In the past few weeks I became very suddenly involved with an organization that recruits teachers to teach for two years, which I will call "Providing America Teachers for our Students for a Year (or two.)" (I'll admit, the real acronym is probably better, as it doesn't resort to my bad parenthetical habit, but mine has its charms.) Before, my only involvement with PATSY was being rejected in 2007 as a corps member, largely due to my inability at the time to form coherent sentences while on the phone. This weakness was mostly ameliorated later that year by temping at a PR firm where I had to make hundreds of cold calls to reporters every day. "Are you interested in hearing about some of the exciting efforts Nike is making to fight childhood obesity in the Jacksonville area? No, you have real reporting to do? Okay, let me know if you change your mind."

There was no PATSY corps in San Antonio when I decided I wanted to teach, so I did a similar, though less intense program to get my certification while teaching my first year. The next year, PATSY came to the River City, and I've worked alongside a handful of PATSYs since then, one of whom works in the classroom across the hall from me.

A PATSY corps member is usually pretty easy to spot. They are young, beautiful, well-dressed and incredibly sincere and idealistic at the beginning of the school year, and increasingly bedraggled and anxious as the year progresses. They post "big goals" in their classroom and keep reams of data on their students to track their progress towards these goals, and watch in horror as the reality of trying to keep up with 110 student's worth of data makes their eyes go bloodshot.

The PATSY across the hall from me had volunteered to lead a PD for other PATSYs, and managed to convince me to help her plan and lead it. Volunteering for this put me back on the radar of the person in charge of Professional Development for the PATSYs in San Antonio, who taught (brilliantly) in the classroom immediately above mine the previous two years. She was looking for someone to lead a middle school math "learning team," so she offered me the position. Suddenly, I was slated on the same day to lead a session that the PATSY and I had over-ambiguously called "Student Centered Learning" and a session where I introduced myself to my new learning team.

Planning these sessions caused me considerably more angst than my typical daily lessons, even though combined they were only about as long as one normal class period for me. I think this is because compared to my sixth graders, I am a mental giant. They know nothing and, relatively, I know everything. When I ask myself what it is that I am qualified to teach an eleven-year-old with an uncertain grasp on English, the answer is: pretty much anything. When I ask myself what I am qualified to teach college-educated adults, the answer is: maybe, hopefully, a way to think about teaching that they haven't been exposed to before, but probably have, that I'm not even certain is all that great but is what I've developed through trial and error, reading, and watching other teachers?

When it came to actually leading these sessions, my confidence was helped by the compulsive positivity and earnestness of the PATSYs, but I soon realized that I had to develop new ways of thinking about classroom management. Quieting a room of thirty kids is really not that hard, because they expect you to tell them what to do, and if you're doing your job, they know they will be held accountable for following your directions. Grown ups don't like to be told what to do. You have to reasonably explain or put into the proper context what you want them to do if you hope for them to do it. (I try to do this with my sixth graders, too, but for most kids, "Because I said so," really is good enough.) If a grown up doesn't see a possible pay-off to something you ask them to do, then they probably won't do it. When I wanted a room with thirty adults to be quiet, I suddenly realized that all my strategies (counting down, clapping, raising my hand, "if you can hear my voice, clap once," etc.) would not win me any points with adults. I used my other technique, which is to just start quietly talking until some of the students start shushing each other, and wait until everyone is quiet to say anything actually important.

I've got five more two-hour sessions to lead over the next five months. I wasn't sure how my introduction to my learning team went, but during lunch, a handsome young gentleman with black frame glasses, a bow-tie, and an anxious/earnest look on his face (classic PATSY) asked me some follow up questions, and I found myself giving him answers and resources that seemed to make his face less anxious and more earnest, which I'll take as a sign that I am not wholly unqualified for this job.

* * *

Disclaimer: My acronym is meant lightly, and I use it to avoid the appearance of publicly criticizing the organization that so recently and kindly employed me. I hold nothing but respect for the organization and the thousands of PATSYs that devote two of the hardest years of their lives to it, especially the ones I work with every day.

Honesty

2012-01-29T14:22:00.000-05:00

I have a student, I'll call her Selene, that has worked incredibly hard in my class. She would be a straight A student, except she is slowed down by not being 100% fluent in English, yet. In math, she more than makes up for that with creative problem solving and that diligent patience necessary for the harder problems. Selene is one of those students I can seat anywhere in the room, and she and the students around her will be successful. (I have way more students who make trying to make a good seating chart like a complex game of chess, where if you make any false move, you open yourself to mate.)

My students carry around "mark cards," which teachers use to give students positive or negative marks based on their behavior. Students are obviously not allowed to write on these, so imagine my shock when across the room I see Selene pick up a yellow highlighter and write on hers. I have a fair amount of time to deal with this as it is after school while we are waiting for the report card night, so I walk across the room to where Selene is sitting and find a yellow highlighter mark in the positive mark section of her card.

"Selene, did you make this mark on your card?"

"No."

"Well, I was way across the room, so I can't be 100% sure, but I saw you pick up this yellow highlighter, and it looked like you wrote on your card with it. Are you sure you didn't write on your card?"

"No, I just moved the highlighter over the card like this. I didn't write anything."

"Well, it looks like the cap is gone to this highlighter, so it's sort of dying. You see when I make another mark on your card with this same highlighter it seems to be the exact same faded yellow as this mark that I think I saw you make. Are you sure you didn't mark this card?"

"I didn't mark it."

"I really want to believe you Selene, but I'm having a hard time understanding why a teacher would use a faded yellow highlighter exactly like the one on your desk to mark your card. Usually teachers use pens or darker markers so we can see the marks on the card more clearly. Which teacher gave you this positive mark, Selene?"

"Mrs. L, but she wasn't giving me a positive mark. She just went like this with her marker on the card."

"Why would she do that?"

"I don't know, but she just went like this with the marker."

"Was she trying to test her marker?"

"I don't know."

"Why would she use the positive mark section of your mark card to test a dying yellow highlighter?"

"That's what she did."

"It would be pretty unusual for Mrs. L to do that, so I think she would probably remember it. If I go talk to Mrs. L right now and show her your mark card, do you think she'll say she did this?"

"Yes."

"Alright, Selene, I really want to believe you, so I'm going to go talk to Mrs. L about this." I return from talking to Mrs. L. "Mrs. L doesn't remember doing this, Selene, and she thinks she would remember doing something as unusual as using a dying yellow highlighter on a mark card. Are you sure that's what happened?"

"Yes." At this point, Selene starts crying. Selene is the picture of sweetness, so I don't feel great causing tears to stream silently down her reddening face. I have her come outside the class to talk with me with less of an audience. I am usually pretty good at overwhelming students with logic and facts until they eventually tell me some version of the truth, but Selene is proving to be a remarkably tough nut to crack. She is either crying because she is becoming overwhelmed with the guilt of lying to a teacher she has always had a strong positive relationship with, or there is the slight chance she is crying because she is telling the truth and I obviously won't believe her. "Look, Selene, I hate to call anyone a liar, because it doesn't feel good to be called a liar. No one wants be a liar, and I don't think that you are a liar, but I am having a very difficult time believing you right now. Did you write on your mark card?"

"No."

"So Selene, the evidence I have is that with my own eyes, I saw you pick up the yellow highlighter and move it over your mark card. When I inspected your card, the mark was exactly the same color as the highlighter you were holding. When I talked to Mrs. L, she did not remember marking your card. The evidence you have is your word and the fact that I was all the way across the room, so I can't be 100% positive I saw you write with the marker. If you were me, would you believe yourself?"

"No."

"Why would you have a hard time believing your story."

"Because you thought you saw me, and the marker was the same color and Mrs. L doesn't remember doing it." Remember I said she was very bright, so her comprehension of this conversation was obviously very high. She wasn't projecting any attitude, just sadness, and even if she was lying, I was beginning to feel like perhaps I had scared her enough already.

"Look, Selene, I'm torn about what to do right now. I really don't like being lied to, and I think it's really important that my students and I have an honest relationship. I think you're lying to me, not because I think you're a liar, but because I think you got scared and then didn't know how to come clean. Selene, are you lying to me?"

"No."

"Do you know what a reputation is?"

"Yes."

"Well there are good reputations and bad reputations, and they both take work to make. I have some students that have worked very hard to make a bad reputation for themselves this year, so if they tell me something that doesn't feel true, I don't believe them. But that's not you, Selene. You have worked so hard this year to have a great reputation with me. You are an outstanding math student, a creative artist, and I've seen what a good friend you are to the other students, and none of those things are easy, and I'm very proud of how you've done them. Because you have such a good reputation with me, I am going to believe you tonight. But I think you understand how hard it is for me to believe you tonight, because of all the evidence we talked about. I believe you tonight, but you have to understand that your reputation got hurt tonight. If you're telling me the truth, then that's not really fair that your reputation is being hurt, and I'm sorry if that's the case. But your reputation getting hurt means that if there's another time when it doesn't feel like you're telling me the truth, it will be much harder for me to believe you. Is that fair?"

"Yes."

"Alright, go back inside, Selene. We've got a report card night to go to."

Selene works so hard to please the adults in her life, and I think what made her so sad was that once she lied once, she thought there was no way to please me. She thought I would be disappointed if she changed her story, or she would get in "big trouble," but she didn't realize I know how difficult honesty is, and I would have been so proud if she had been able to tell me the truth, even though she lied to begin with. If she had come clean, I would have given her a token consequence for the false mark, but then it would have been over. Since she couldn't stop lying (which she obviously was, despite what I said to her), I gave her the worst consequence I could think of: I stopped trusting her.

Cereal Offender

2012-01-28T11:24:00.001-05:00

One of my weaknesses as a teacher is helping my students keep organized. I have a hard time prioritizing what I want them to hold on to, or even deciding if it's important to hold onto anything at all. We have so much new content to cover, I rarely have them go back to an assignment from more than a few days ago, and the amount of work needed to get every student to hold on to something never seemed to pay dividends on the time invested. So I keep dumping paper on my students every day, and some hold on to every scrap and some throw it all away, and I have a hard time caring one way or the other.

This year, I wanted to have some sort of portfolio system where students could keep their major assessments and projects in their own space in the classroom. I had experimented with something like this with hanging file crates my first year, but they became classroom management nightmares as only a few kids at a time could use the crates, and they became hotbeds of socializing and unproductivity as students cycled through filing or retrieving their papers. This summer, I priced out mailboxes, cubbies, and all sorts of different shelving, but couldn't find a solution that I thought would work for under a couple hundred dollars.

The desks in my classroom are something like this one, and I was trying to think of a way to subdivide the inside effectively so the four different students that used it during the day would each have one section to keep their important work in. I thought this would nicely solve my portfolio problem, and have the ancillary benefit of students being able to take some ownership of the space inside their desk, which would mean they would be less likely to see the inside as a conveniently located trashcan for their various effects. Without custom constructing something, I wasn't finding any sort of desk insert or organizer that I thought would work and be cost effective, but then I thought of cereal boxes.

Four normal-sized cereal boxes fit almost perfectly inside the desks. I could have kids decorate and take ownership of their own portfolio box, and it would be a nice way to help them document their growth through the year. At then end of the year, I could have them look at how easy the work was they were doing at the beginning of the year, and how far they had come. I started collecting my own cereal boxes. I sent out an all-staff email asking other teachers to bring me their cereal boxes. I asked my students to bring in any cereal boxes their family finished. And lo, there was a bounty of cereal boxes. Within a week or two, I had collected about 70, and I needed 110 to cover all my students, plus a few extras when students messed up their boxes or a box was too large to fit in the desk. So I remade my pleas to the other teachers and students to bring in the boxes. Asking twice was the mistake that I most regret, because if I had just asked once, my relationship with the boxes would have ended months ago.

The cereal box idea was not a bad one, but I hadn't completely thought it through. Right around when the 110th box appeared in my classroom, I got to work on making a sample portfolio as a model for my students. At this time I discovered what Tony the Tiger or Lucky or Toucan Sam don't want you to know: cereal boxes are almost all less than 8.5 inches wide. Generally, this doesn't detract from the breakfast experience, but if you are an un-dextrous eleven year old trying to shove your most important papers into a box in a frantic hurry at the end of class, you are going to be incredibly frustrated. I realized the boxes wouldn't work, which was too bad because I had 110 of them sitting on the shelving in my classroom.

I have tried to think of some other project or activity that justified the cornucopia of boxes, and no inspiration has hit, but I'm convinced one will before the end of the year, so I hold on to the boxes. The monolith of boxes in my room and the repeated email plea means that everyone still thinks I need cereal boxes. Two or three times a month, I will find a fresh stack of boxes at my desk or in my classroom, with brightly colored mascots on the fronts, smiling and laughing at my folly. (Also, the stack of twenty I personally collected but never brought to school still stand next to my bed, leaning against my bedroom wall in quiet mockery.) I realize I should send out an email explaining that I don't need any more boxes, but I've been reluctant, as to do so would in a way admit that I never really needed all of those boxes in the first place, and would imply I wasn't grateful for their continuing generosity.

The boxes remain in my classroom as one of those things that my students quietly ponder about me. As the months pass, one of the bolder students will occasionally ask me what we are going to do with all those cereal boxes. To which I usually reply, coyly, "We'll just have to wait and see."

Why Don't You Teach Music?

2012-01-22T12:45:00.002-05:00

A question I frequently get which I've never had a good answer for is, "Why don't you teach music?" In middle school, I was definitely a trumpet-playing band geek, utterly loyal to Mr. Norris' concert band, jazz band, marching band. My high school didn't have much of a band program to speak of when I arrived, but my incredible, hawaiian-shirt wearing choir teacher, Carol, took us to Cuba and introduced me to music theory. My sophomore year, Carol moved on to administration and was replaced by the incredibly disciplined, energetic and young Jeff, who taught us how to sight-sing and strive for perfection in every performance. My success in these programs was also largely due to my elementary piano lessons and the great Mrs. Keller at my elementary school. Each of these teachers were incredibly formative and influential on me as a musician, but also as a maturing young adult.

My High School Choir before Jeff completed the transition to Tuxedos

I selected a liberal arts college because I had no notion of what I wanted to study, and it seemed like the broadest, most flexible type of program. It quickly became apparent by the classes that I was signing up for and was most engaged by that I was a music major. At Grinnell, there was no way to be a music education major, or even a music/education double major, and the two education classes I took were mired in the soft science of sociology and turned me away from pursuing more. What drew me in instead were the most abstract branches of music: analysis and composition. These were especially appealing because they could be done proficiently without a virtuoso's ear or technique, which I had always lacked the single-minded obsession with practice required to effectively develop.

After leaving college, I found that lacking the shelter, support and deadlines of academia, I was not really a composer. Instead, I found I rather enjoyed teaching, and had some talent with math. The progression of how a concept could be broken down to its most simple parts made intuitive sense in math, where I had no idea where to begin to teach students to read or write. My first year teaching, I had the opportunity to try to teach both music and math (which I fear I did both rather badly that year.) As the year progressed, teaching music felt like more and more of a chore, where the challenge of teaching math became more and more nuanced and interesting.

I thought that with all of the incredible and influential music teachers I had in my life, I would enjoy and have some talent at teaching music. But I found it tedious, and I'm sure my students did as well, because they told me so. But this doesn't mean that I have suddenly grown distant in my relationship with music. Last night, I went to the San Antonio Symphony and heard them dig into three Beethoven symphonies. I was deeply moved by the gusto of their playing, especially in the bombastic finale to the fifth, where the sweating conductor could barely stay on the podium while every musician played at full volume. I didn't find anything about the experience tedious, and it got me thinking about why I found teaching music to be so boring.

For anyone that's taken any education class or education professional development, you've been subjected to Bloom's Taxonomy, which loathe as I am to admit that Bloom's Taxonomy was ever helpful to me in any way, explains why I enjoy teaching math more than music. Bloom's breaks down types of learning based on cognitive demand:

VI) Creating
V) Evaluating
IV) Analyzing
III) Applying
II) Understanding
I) Remembering

The reason it is constantly brought up in education classes is that every teacher should strive to make every lesson hit the highest possible levels of cognitive demands, rather than the old-school reliance on rote memorization and comprehension of facts. I've never had much use for Bloom's because I tend to demand the highest levels by default and probably to a fault. This is not a boast, but something I've discovered about myself by analyzing my results. Based on my data, I do an okay job of raising the grade levels of my lowest students an adequate amount, but the place I have the flashiest results is by pushing students to the highest level. For example, last year 2% of my students tested at a 10th grade level or higher at the beginning of the year, but 25% did at the end of the year. If anything, I use Bloom's to remind myself that I still need to spend some teaching time on Understanding and Remembering, which I find about as interesting as doing the dishes.

I think this explains why I didn't enjoy teaching music. It takes such a significant amount of time (years) of grinding away at the bottom three levels of Bloom's before a music student is prepared to do really high level thinking about music. I would never say that high level thinking doesn't happen in music - the collaboration and intensity of focus necessary to achieve a perfect performance, or the synthesis of all the information necessary for filling in a figured bass line come to mind - but very little of that is happening when a student is first learning the treble clef or the fingerings on the alto saxophone. Whereas in math, I can teach you what a parallelogram is in the same class that I have you applying and comparing and analyzing this new piece of information with everything you already know about angles, rectangles and triangles. To me, the thrill of teaching is a student engaging and solving a problem they would not have been able to solve before the class began, which I get to do almost every day as a math teacher.

To avoid too much hate-mail from my music teaching friends, I think I should close by reminding you that I opened with how incredibly influential and important my music teachers have been throughout my life. I have nothing but admiration for music teachers and the work they do, and I am certainly a product of a series of great music teachers. Still, for now, I'd rather teach math.

Consume

2012-01-15T16:46:00.000-05:00

When I pull into my driveway after a typical day of work, I wait for the story I'm listening to on All Things Considered on NPR to end (that's if I've made it out of work at a decent hour; too many nights it's Marketplace, or the dreaded On Point, which Tom Ashbrook barely elevates above morning talk radio.) Within a minute of entering, I've let in and fed Thelonious and put on my Apple iPod, playing an iTunes Podcast or an Audible Audiobook.

After changing, eating dinner and walking Thelonious a few blocks (the walk's length is directly proportional to the quality of the story I'm listening to), I usually connect my MacBook Pro to my Sony Bravia flatscreen and Polk Audio surround soundbar and watch a television show or two through Hulu or Netflix. Whilst I watch, I'll surf through articles on my Apple iPad at some of my favorite sites like Slate, Wired, NYtimes, or The Onion, or play Zynga Poker (not for real money, Mom) or some other game. I also compulsively flip through Facebook status updates on my HTC G2, occasionally blessing them with a comment, or check through OKCupid to see if online dating has become any less bleak or miserable than the last time I checked the day before. When I start nodding off on the couch, I'll brush my teeth while trying to finish whatever New Yorker article I started that morning, then crawl into bed with my Amazon Kindle and read an ebook until I can't keep my eyes open anymore.

I don't worry about the amount of technology I use. Each new gadget or service I adopt serves some new brilliant niche in my life that I didn't know needed to be filled, but once filled becomes delightfully indispensable. This dependency doesn't particularly trouble me any more than my dependency on people that know how to build houses, sew, manufacture goods, farm, or any of those other vital skills I rely on of which I have absolutely none.

I don't worry so much about how much I have as what I lack, which is downtime during the day when I am not consuming some sort of media so that I am stuck with nothing but my own thoughts to entertain me. Having a magical phone in my pocket means there's no such thing as a time when I can't be in touch with some sort of entertainment. Times that used to be the province of daydreaming and pondering (filling up at the pump, waiting in line, pooping) are now times to finish reading that article or update my status. My concern about not having enough "think" time is one of the reasons I keep this blog. Writing a post is a way of making myself sit down and think through which narratives in my life are important and to try to find some meaning in them. But even this Google Blogspot blog is me consuming another tech product, though it is a much less passive form of consumption than my normal watching, reading or listening.

Is time alone with your thoughts essential? Is it possible that through constant consumption of stories and information, I might be learning more than I could possibly have imagined without having read that profile of Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw's pioneering healthcare in the male dominated India or heard that story about the Milgram experiment with such a more nuanced interpretation than the conventional interpretation that most people are bad so they'll keep pushing the pain button if you dress up in a white lab coat and tell them to. Or is learning impossible if I never stop consuming long enough to digest?

Thelonious Mutt

2011-12-31T20:58:00.006-05:00

After pet-sitting Emily's dogs for a couple months last fall, despite Herbie being in the bottom 4% of dogs during that time, I found myself missing having a dog around. I was finding excuses to run errands near the Humane society so I could pop in and play with their dogs for a while. I was also going on long walks after work to de-stress, which looks commonplace if you have a dog in front of you, but vaguely uni-bomber-ish without one.

What tipped me over the edge was my roommate pestering me to get a puppy that she could play with when she got home without worrying about taking care of it. I didn't want a puppy, because that's a pretty long commitment; I was hoping to find a perfect 12 year old dog that I could enjoy for a year or two before it keeled over.

When I went to the Humane society, I played with all the dogs that weren't barking or jumping around like crazy. Many people make the mistake Emily and I made with Herbie of assuming that when a dog is jumping around barking when it sees you that it means that dog is excited to see you. A dog jumping around and barking when it sees you actually means that dog jumps around and barks whenever it sees anyone, and will continue to do that forever.

I spent ten minutes with one mute dog that was so neurotic that after two steps out the door, it wanted to go back inside. I pet and spoke soothing words to it for a solid five minutes and coaxed him another four or five steps before abject terror seized the dog and he pulled us back to the door. I played with a promising beagle that was completely blind and had a bad limp; he seemed like a promising candidate for keeling over quickly, but eventually I realized that I don't really have the time right now for a super high-maintenance dog, so I settled on the quiet, shy dog that was tragically less than a year old, but managed not to bark once during the couple times I took him out, despite being surrounded by fifty dogs who were barking.

My family tradition (or perhaps the tradition I imposed on my family) is to name pets after jazz musicians. So far there's been Satchmo, Jelly Roll, Herbie, Dizzy, and Nemesis (who's name is in the process of transitioning to Nina Simone.) I was torn between Mingus and Thelonious for this new addition, but my roommate insisted that Mingus sounded too much like a disease or some sort of growth, so I've got Mingus saved for some other dog.

I drove with Thelonious to Virginia for Christmas, and he was an excellent roadtripper. He didn't complain once about the audiobooks I listened to, and he mostly just slept the whole way. He gave me a lot of opportunities to stretch my legs and run laps around gas stations and rest stops, not to mention a good excuse to indulge my tiny bladder on a regular basis.

Sometime at the end of my first night on a dark highway as I was passing through the middle of Nowhere, Mississippi, I passed a trooper perhaps a little faster than I intended to be driving. I drove for a few more minutes and was about to allow myself to think the trooper overlooked my indiscretion when the blue lights started flashing behind me. The officer tapped on my passenger window as I was searching through the glove box for my registration. I cranked down the window (that's right, I don't have power windows) and the sound of dogs barking drifted in through my window. I was struck by the fact that this cop looked younger than me. Man, I'm getting old.

"Drivers license. Is that your dog back there?"

"Yes, sir, I adopted him about a month ago."

"Is this your current address, on Mulberry Avenue?

"Yes, sir."

"How long have you been living in San Antonio?"

"About four years."

"Are you from San Antonio?"

"No, sir, I grew up in Virginia."

"Why did you move to San Antonio?"

"I volunteered for a non-profit that place me in a school in San Antonio, and I stayed on as a teacher there once my volunteer year was over."

"What do you teach?"

"Sixth grade math, sir."

"Where are you driving"

"I'm driving to Virginia to visit my family for the holidays."

"Virginia? That's a pretty long drive."

"Well, I wasn't planning on doing it all tonight. I was planning on stopping pretty soon."

"Is this license current?"

"Yes, sir."

"How many tickets have you had?" I have to think about this for a second, and I heard the sound of barking continue somewhere in the background. While I was thinking, he cut me off, "Have you gotten a lot of tickets? How many tickets have you had in the last couple years?"

"I don't think I've gotten a ticket in the last five years, sir."

"Alright, sir, slow down, and have a good night."

"Yes, sir."

As I drove away, I tried to piece together how I possible got out of even a written warning when it hit me. The barking I had heard was coming from the trooper's car. He was some sort of K-9 trooper, and the first thing he asked me about was my dog. Thelonious had sat there silently staring at the trooper while I pet him during that whole interview, which must have worked some sort of dog-lover voodoo on the trooper. Good boy, Thelonious.

Hair

2011-12-11T19:19:00.001-05:00

As a boy, I had white-blonde hair and a big cowlick. When I had short hair, this meant the hair on the right side of my head sticking straight up, and when the butt-cut became fashionable in middle school, it meant one side curved in a swooping arc while the other side lay flat again my forehead. As I entered adolescence, my hair darkened, my cowlick mellowed, and I developed a draculean widow's peak.

On one family trip when I was fourteen I waded back to the beach after swimming in the ocean, with my hair wet and back against my head. I caught an amused look on dad's face. I asked him what was funny, and he said that my hair looked just like his brother Joe's at my age. I didn't find this amusing, as Uncle Joe is fairly bald, and I was suddenly faced with a dire genetic inevitability that contradicted my unconscious worldview of immortality, indestructibility and infallibility. I had thought myself safe from this particular fate, as I had learned in seventh grade science as we studied Mendel that baldness was a trait generally carried through the mother, and pictures of my mother's father showed him with most of his hair even towards the end of his life. I can't remember a single other detail of that trip, but as prophecies do, my father's words stuck with me.

I've never been able to decide what to do with my hair. My indecision caused me to grow my hair past my ears several times in middle school and high school, only to find that I couldn't make the commitment to have truly long hair, so I would buzz it all off just as it was reaching that threshold. Every time I went to the barber, my indecision combined with my social awkwardness and I always left with a cut completely unlike what I wanted, which only compounded my dread of the barber. The constant flux of my hairstyle caused my older sister's friend Michael to say that I had tried more hairstyles than anyone else he had ever met.

My first semester of college, I was cast in a student led production of Hair. Much like the high school productions I was in, I was overconfident in my singing and under-confident in my dancing, which inevitably doomed both endeavors. Unlike my high school productions, where the cast party was always held after the final performance in some parent's basement where soda and chips were served, the Hair cast parties were boozy affairs that happened a couple times a week throughout the two months of rehearsal. The stated purpose for this was to get the cast comfortable enough with each other to get naked on stage in the climax of the show, while the unstated purpose was for the director to have as many opportunities as possible to make out with as much of the cast and crew as possible, or failing that, to encourage us into greater and greater debauchery and nakedness as the show approached.

My clunky attempts at a tap number as I sang "Manchester England" led to private rehearsals with the choreographer, a fifth-year senior who was doing her semester of practice teaching. Private rehearsals led to a romance, which we kept private from the rest of the cast until after the show was over, avoiding claims of favoritism in the rehearsals. (I don't think there was any real cause for concern here because of my dreadful dancing, but a secret, forbidden romance is always more interesting.)

I grew my hair out as much as the two months allowed, and during tech week the costume designer actually had to thin out my hair with scissors to keep it from blocking my face. It may have been the most confident I will ever be in my life. I was the lead in a show, I had a thick head of hair, and I was an eighteen year-old kid dating a twenty-three year-old woman. I sang the titular song, and really meant it:

Give me a head with hair, long beautiful hair.

Shining, gleaming, streaming, flaxen, waxen.

Give me down to there hair, shoulder length or longer.

Here baby, there mama, everywhere daddy, daddy,

Hair, flow it, show it, long as God can grow it, my hair.

After the show was over, the artificial community of the cast began to drift apart, and the strangeness of a woman dating a boy began to sink in and become increasingly apparent. At the same time, the realities of the ambitious course-load that the fallacy of AP courses being college level had led me to enroll in began to sink in.

As finals approached, Iowa winter sank in, and my relationship with the choreographer soured, it suddenly occurred to me what eventually occurs to every member of my generation despite everything we've been told: maybe I wasn't the most special, smartest, and talented guy my age. Maybe I couldn't get an A, as long as I felt like it.

My inscrutable Linear Algebra class convinced me that I very well might fail a class, despite some level of effort (not an impressive level of effort, to be sure.) I managed a B minus in the class, which I attribute entirely to the incompetence of the professor to assess exactly how little I knew about the subject. I went home that winter break deeply humbled, and after a month of recuperation and reflection at home, probably a much more bearable human being than the know-it-all I was at the beginning of the semester.

* * *

It's hard to say when my hair began to start thinning in earnest. I have kept fairly careful track of my widow's peak, and though the summit has remained at approximately the same altitude, the climb to the peak has grown steadily steeper as base camp has moved further and further up my head. My perception that not only was base camp drifting, but the side of the mountain was the site of noticeable deforestation came to me very slowly over the course of this year. Perhaps it has been obvious to my friends and family (especially the taller ones) for longer than that, but if so, they have politely observed my follicular failure without a word. (That is, except for my most loyal reader, Donald, who admitted to me at a bar, after my insistence for honesty, that I had noticeably less hair than when we first met.)

In a fortunate coincidence, or in some subconscious preparation of things to come, I have always liked hats, and like to think that I wear them reasonably well. It is, however, hard to find hats that fit my head. On a different family vacation as a teenager, I stepped into a hat-store, only to find none that fit me as the flummoxed and ancient clerk busied herself trying to find one that might, wondering out loud how such a skinny little white kid could have such a big head.

As the zero-hour approaches, I have been consciously trying to build up my hat collection and rarely pass by a hat-rack without stopping. Today, at a particularly good one, I was racked with indecision for probably ten minutes as I tried on hat after hat. As I tried on a grey felt fedora for the third time, a gorgeous woman with flowing brown hair and dark piercing eyes walked by and said, "That one." I managed to spit out an inarticulate, "This one?" and she nodded with an inscrutable grin as she walked out of the store. For all I know, the woman is on the payroll of the store, because there was absolutely no way that I could avoid purchasing the hat at that point, despite it being considerably more expensive than the others I had considered.

At some point in the near future, I will have to do what all sensible balding men must eventually do and lose the pretense of scissors and take the plunge with the buzzer or razor. Harbingers of this moment come more and more frequently now. At one of my more recent haircuts, the barber asked me if I wanted to keep a particular section longer, as many men liked to use it "to pretend." At some level, it is a relief that my hair decision will soon be made for me, and my dreaded trips to the barber will finally be over. One of the things I used to tell myself was that the reason I hated the barber so much was that I hated spending money and time on something purely for vanity's sake. As haircuts approach obsolescence for me, I find this claim put to the test.

Futon Story

2011-12-08T16:23:00.001-05:00

When I moved here, I managed to fit all of my worldly possession into the family's Toyota Camry that I drove the 28 hours down to San Antonio. I lived in a "mother-in-law cottage" behind the real house of a couple I found on Craigslist. One of the perks of the diminutive abode was being furnished, including a bed on wheels (that tended to wander when I rolled in my sleep) and a futon. The futon was my base of operations during my scant waking hours in the apartment, cushioning my butt through dinners, breakfasts and movies watched on my laptop.

The apartment's price was right, and it was a quick bike or bus-ride to work, but it was edged by cemeteries on three sides, neighborhoods of dilapidated houses on the fourth, and packs of stray dogs surrounding. The same generosity of spirit and compassion that made my landlord waive my rent in months when my puny water-heater crapped out made her especially susceptible to these strays. She had her own manicured, purebred cockerdoodle or chihuatzu or something that stayed in her house, but shortly after I moved in, she took in a stray rottweiler. She didn't so much take it in, as that would involve taking it into her house, but she did neuter, feed, and chain it outside my door. (I realize that wasn't clear: she didn't neuter it outside my door.)

I named the dog Atlas because he was big and strong enough to hold a planet, and he had a face like maybe he had been made to for a while. He wasn't used to being chained up, and sometimes when I got home, I would have to untangle him and lift his 90 pound mass over the chain link fence he had managed to get over, nearly hanging himself. He was incredibly sweet, but I learned to give him a wide berth after he destroyed a pair of headphones by jumping up on me and inadvertently yanking them out of my ears. I steered clear of him until my landlord "took in" a pit but that she chained to the other side of my house, which meant there was about 11 inches that I could squeeze through without getting jumped on by a very sweet and massive canine. At that point, I resigned myself to paw-prints on my shoulders.

One of the things I learned in City Year was that sometimes there is a fine line between a service project and vandalism. At one project that tended towards the latter, one well-meaning volunteer managed to dump an entire gallon of rust red paint onto the parking lot of the campus we were allegedly beautifying with amateur murals and poorly planted trees that died a few weeks later. After much paint thinner, hosing and scrubbing, I managed to transform the puddle of paint into a fainter and much larger blotch, but not before getting a large portion of the paint on myself.

I thought in the San Antonio June heat, the worst of the paint on me had dried before driving home, but the evidence in my family's car tells a different story. My younger sister drives that car now, and I imagine her passengers getting an uneasy feeling when they notice the blood-red stains on the driver's side. (That's assuming that she has any friends, which I never do.) When I got home after working in the sun all day, I collapsed on the futon, inadvertently leaving a similar scene of gore on its mattress.

When I was moving out of that apartment, I considerately flipped the futon over, but my landlord ended up giving me the futon and the bed on wheels to get me started on furnishing my new place with Emily. I was able to squeeze both, along with all of my other worldly possessions into the passenger van I "borrowed" from City Year. I bought some pads to stop the bed from rolling and threw the futon in my guest room (storage room,) putting some sheets on it to hide the apparent blood stains.

I forgot I owned the futon until it was time to move again. There were many reasons that we chose to move, but chief among them was our landlord who was interesting in that he was prone to long conversations about Bulgarian folk music, but strange in that he would fall asleep in our kitchen while working on the tile job that was three months overdue. There is nothing like a move to remind you of all the junk that you have been schlepping from place to place, but somehow the futon made the cut of stuff that we would haul the mile to our new place. Along with Emily, now I had enough stuff for a Uhaul truck.

The futon was flopped in the guest room, which became my dressing room, as I generally woke up an hour or two or three before Emily, and I didn't like to turn on the lights or make too much noise in our bedroom. The futon became my sock-sorting station. I have never sorted socks immediately after washing and drying them. Instead, I create dubious pairs every morning by digging through a black mass of mismatched sockery. I would put the socks away for the occasional guest we entertained, but the socks would come back out on the next laundry day.

After Emily moved out, my budget started to get uncomfortably tight, so I needed to find a roommate to help split the rent. I posted an ad on Craigslist, and fielded a handful of responses, trying to set up meetings with the candidates that seemed to have more potential. This was at the same time that I was venturing out into the internet-dating world, where I was doing much the same thing. Eventually, I found a suitable candidate (for a roommate) and she moved in.

My roommate used the futon for a couple weeks, but when she bought a real bed (no wheels) I offered to dispose of the futon for her. At first, I tried a method of disposal of bulky goods that to date had not failed me. In San Antonio, if you place almost anything on your curb, someone will take it within a few hours. I had done this with broken bookshelves, broken baby-gates, broken dog-crates, random clothes, etc. However, after a few days, I realized that the gory futon was below the standards of whatever people usually hauled away my stuff, so I had to research official channels of disposal.

I figured that Goodwill was unlikely to take a used, stained futon mattress. The city was willing to pick it up off my curb for $50, which seemed a little high for just a futon, and private waste companies were about the same. I packed the futon into the trunk of my car (after about 20 minutes of sweating and grunting) with the idea that I would find some dumpster to quietly chuck the futon into, but the only dumpster I see every day is the one I park next to at work, and it felt too sketchy to take a futon out of my trunk. Not to mention the indignity it would require to carry the futon and the chance of one of my students me, as there is no graceful way to hold and throw a futon into a dumpster. The futon was out of sight, out of mind, so I didn't think about the futon until getting groceries and popping the trunk, only to realize that there wasn't enough space in my trunk for a single frozen dinner, much less my bag of them.

After a month of weighing down the back of my car and surprising me on my infrequent stops to the grocery store, I decided that the futon had to go. I tried shoving it into my normal garbage can, which it more or less fit in without tipping over the can, but it was a tight enough fit and enough mattress stuck out that I worried the garbage truck wouldn't accept it on pick-up. So I took an exacto knife and hacked the futon into pieces. I took out handfulls of stuffing and put them in trash bags, while putting the foam padding into my recycling bin. Eventually, the lid of the garbage container came within six inches of closing, which seemed sufficient. The garbage man took mercy and accepted it, and the next week, I threw two more bags of futon stuffing away. All in all, I was satisfied with my lateral creative problem solving.

* * *

I'm not sure why I spent so long telling such a rambling story about a futon, and I apologize to those of you who read through it. I have no explanation except that it must be some sort of metaphor, because what is growing up, really, if not a gradual process of throwing away our futons and buying a real couch?

Why don't they just give them what they want?

2011-11-18T11:05:00.001-05:00

Something else I sometimes do with my guys during advisory is play a few minutes of watered-down news in the morning and talk to them about any questions they have and try to get them to form opinions and ideas about the world around them. My guys are at such a reflective and self-centered developmental stage, my hope is to try to get them to connect at least a little with the outside world. (CNN has a great daily resource called "student news" for any teachers out there interested in doing the same thing. The only problem I have with it is they talk a little too quickly for my English Language Learners.)

Some of the conversations these videos spark can be pretty interesting, although it generally ends up as me spending a lot of time trying to explain what we just saw at a sixth grade level or why it matters. Why is it important that Tunisia is in uprising, or didn't we just see a video about protests in Syria, or was that rebels in Libya? Why do they keep playing news about unemployment, or what does it mean that 10% of the country is unemployed? What is the deal with congress? Seriously, what is its deal?

Mostly, I am pretty good about keeping very politically neutral in these discussions. I will clarify misconceptions and provide facts, but I try not to say anything that contradicts what their parents may tell them (unless what their parents tell them is wrong; I am a teacher, after all.) Friday morning, I played a clip about the two month anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street protest.

Me: Are there any questions about today's news?

Student 1: Why don't they just give the protesters what they want so they can go home?

Me: Well, why do you guys think they don't just give the protesters what they want?

Student 2: Maybe they like having money, so they don't want to stop being in the one percent.

Student 1: But the protesters aren't being violent. Couldn't they just give the protesters their demands?

Me: Well, maybe. What do the protesters want?

All: Silence.

Me: What demands are the protesters making?

All: Silence.

Me: Are the protesters making any demands?

Student 3: No?

Me: The protesters haven't said what they want. The only thing the protesters seem to know for certain is that they are unhappy with how things are now.

Student 1: Buy how come the rich people keep getting richer and richer than everyone else?

I try to avoid too much economic news because of this situation. How do you explain wealth disparity to a sixth grader?
Me: That is a great question. Why do you guys think that rich people might be able to get more and more money while poor people stay poor?

All: Silence.

Me: Well, who has the power in this country?

Student 4: What do you mean power?

Me: Who makes the most decisions for our country?

Student 5: The president?

Me: The president? Well, can the president do whatever he wants? Does he get to decide whatever the country is going to do?

Student 6: Yes?

Me: Do you guys see or hear a lot of stories about President Obama saying that he is going to do something, and then everyone says, "Great, let's do that," and then President Obama gets his way?

Students: Noooo...

Student 5: What about congress?

Me: Have you seen any stories on the news where the president and congress can't agree on something?

Students: Yeesss.

Me: So who has the power?

Students: Congress?

Me: But congress is made up of a lot of people. Who decides what congress does?

Student 2: The governor?

Me: So Rick Perry calls up congress every morning and tells them what to do?

Students: Noooo...

Me: So who tells congress what to do?

Student 3: We do.

Me: What do you mean by that?

Student 3: The people tell congress what to do. They're supposed to listen to us.

Me: But which people tell congress what to do?

All: Silence.

Student 3: All of them?

Me: That may be true that we can all vote, and we can all write a letter to tell congress what we think they should do, but which people do you think congress listens to the most?

Student 2: The governor?

Earlier that morning, a student I'll call Fatty had told me a story about a student I'll call Angry that had happened at the potluck the night before. (On a side-side note, I am fairly proud of the chili I made for the potluck that was so spicy that little old Mexican ladies were stepping outside to get air, and the men (of which there are precious few in my students' lives or at the potluck) pushed out their chests and swaggered a little bit to hide the sweat on their brow after eating it.) As best I can tell, Angry had been trying to save a seat with a backpack, which fatty pushed to the floor, and sat in the seat. When Angry asked for Fatty to move, Fatty said something to the extent of, "Make me," and Angry said, "How could I possibly get you to move when you're so fat?" Fatty clearly told me his side of the story hoping to get Angry in trouble, but Angry was already in a fair amount of trouble for other issues, and Fatty came across as such a rude brat about the situation, I had a hard time caring.

Still, I can't have Angry calling Fatty fat, so I went over and talked to Angry, and asked him what had happened with him and Fatty the night before. Angry immediately said that I was just like all the other teachers and never believed him. I said I thought that was a little unfair because he hadn't actually told me anything to not believe yet. I told him that at that moment I only had half of the story, and I was really hoping I could have his side of the story before I made any decisions about what I believed. He said that I was just going to believe what Fatty said, which I said was probable if I didn't get to hear Angry's side of the story, but if I did hear Angry's side of the story, I may be able to make a better decision about what I believe.

That went on for some time, Angry refusing to tell me what had happened and insisting that no one ever listened to him. I ended by telling Angry that if he decided he wanted to tell me his side of the story, he could write it down and give it to me before lunch. I gave Angry some cool-off space so he spent the rest of advisory moodily sulking in the corner until this moment in our class discussion when I had asked who had the most power and influence in our country, and (without raising his hand, of course) Angry darkly proclaims from the corner, "Rich people."

Unfortunately, advisory ended at exactly that moment, so I didn't have time to go any further than this, except to say, "Exactly. Have a great day guys, and go to class."

The Evolution of Ultimate Chess

2011-10-28T11:10:00.002-04:00

Every morning, 15 boys trickle into my classroom for advisory. During advisory I check the student's homework, giving them praise or consequences and the guys work on their math and reading "Morning Work." We get breakfast together and the guys go to their lockers to organize themselves for the day. After finishing their Morning Work, the guys eagerly go about their assigned advisory jobs. Two boys set up the projector, one files my classwork, another goes around and checks the supply boxes, and others do various chores to help me set-up for the day and help them take ownership of their environment. Once they finish their jobs, they get quiet free time in the section of my room I call the "Dorm Room."

In the Dorm Room, I have a carpet and some very dorm-y furniture. This year, I started an after-school chess club, so I've got a plethora of chess boards and pieces stored in the dorm. At the beginning of the year, my guys were more interested in the Uno deck and the deck of cards I had, but Uno is a really boring game, and the only card game they knew was War, so those games began to fizzle after a few weeks. The guys brought in their own Pokemon Cards, which apparently are still popular, and read through them and traded with each other, though never playing the actual game. They exhausted that after trading entire decks back forth. Eventually, after a few of them coming to chess club and getting familiar with the rules and pieces, they started pulling out the chess boards.

At first, they studiously set up the chess boards correctly, teaching the boys that did not know the rules, and trying their best to complete a game. But they started to get frustrated by the complexity of chess, and they also had a strong tendency to want the whole group to participate. I'm not sure when it happened, but suddenly they were playing with two boards pushed next to each other.

When they first started, they had the pieces set up correctly on both boards and played in two sets of partners (plus a healthy crowd kibitzing.) One partner would play on one board, then the other would play on the other board, and then the other partners would get to play. The twist was that pieces were allowed to traverse onto the adjacent board. Complications soon arose as they started parsing out the strategy. At first, each partner operated fairly independently of the other, but eventually they started to realize the power of collusion. If both partners moved the same piece in succession, they could capture almost any piece on the board. After this realization, games became a bloodbath of aggressive play.

They hit a snag when they realized how vulnerable kings were. Traditionally, when you put a king in danger, you say "check" and the king is able to protect itself, but in Double Chess, you could put the king in check and take it in the same turn. They established a rule that you could take the first king in this way, but you had to put the second king in a traditional "check mate" situation to finish the game.

As the play became decreasingly two individuals playing and more about the joint pair working collaboratively, they also decided they didn't really need to set up the two boards with the traditional chess set-up. Instead, they doubled up all the pieces next to each other. Two rooks on the outside, with two knights next to them, and two kings standing next to each other in between the boards.

They played with this set-up for a couple weeks, but eventually they began to take more and more ownership of the game. The new rule was that the front row had to be pawns, but the back row could be arranged however they felt. I've enjoyed watching them experiment with different strategies. Some like to stack one side of the board with all the most powerful pieces, while others carefully spread them out.

I interviewed the guys about Double Chess the last couple mornings while I was thinking about writing about them to flesh out what I had observed and to clarify all of the current rules. I asked them what they called their game, and there was no real consensus. Double Chess! Super Chess! Ultimate Chess! Jumbo Chess! Something about the act of naming their game brought out a real sense of pride in their creation. They started talking about publishing the rules to their game and getting other people to play.

Personally, I can't wait to see the next evolution of Ultimate Chess.

Survivor Preparedness: Adaptable to New Environments

2011-09-05T15:26:00.002-04:00

This week, I managed, with help from the interwebs, to go on a date with a real life human woman. My greatest anxiety going into the date was that I wouldn't be able to sustain a conversation with a stranger for a reasonable amount of time. I am more comfortable in a small group where a couple of friends can be responsible for the flying buttresses and cantilevers of the conversation while I busy myself sculpting the occasional gargoyle along the edges. When the conversation turns to something I have a strong opinion on, I can take the lead for short periods, but am generally happy to let others resume the heavy lifting after a time.

I am currently reading a massive tome on the Civil War my father gave me, and much of the military strategy revolved around choosing the appropriate battlefield and retreating and advancing your troops until you found that spot that gave your army the advantage over the other. If my weak flank was to be conversation, I wanted to choose a theater of operations that naturally provided many prompts and intermissions. Growing up using the internet, I learned there are two things that are universally compelling to the human race, and the more popular one seemed declasse on a first date, so I chose cute animals; the dog park was to be our rendezvous.

Though full of fluffy and energetic conversational distractions, the dog park posed a small problem; I don't actually own a dog. I am, however, taking care of Emily's dogs while she travels these weekends for various frisbee tournaments. This created a dilemma that I considered while driving to the dog park. I could claim the dogs were mine, which is not far from the truth as they have lived in my house for a couple years. This carried the risk that it may sabotage future dates with this woman after the monsters finally move out as I stumbled to explain where my dogs went. I also considered full disclosure about the ownership of the dogs, but I think I've read somewhere or seen on TV that you're not supposed to talk about past relationships on the first few dates.

I settled on telling the truth, if a limited one: "I'm pet-sitting for a friend." I realized this may cut off valuable conversational avenues about the dogs if I wasn't supposed to know the monsters very well, not to mention the fact that the dogs clearly know and respond to me, so I appended, "Yeah, I've been sitting them for about a month, so they know me pretty well," which was more or less true, as before this month, it was not really considered pet-sitting.

In retrospect, perhaps I should have avoided the dog park altogether. I am not particularly skilled in navigating these half-truths, so whenever my date asked me about the dogs, I sputtered something incoherent or became quiet and awkward. The dogs should have been a reliable go-to conversational restarter, but instead they became landmines that I tried to gingerly avoid. Herbie further cemented my regret for the choice of location by choosing a four-month old beagle to sexually harass for the entirety of the date. There were probably twenty five dogs in the park, and Herbie was literally the only one humping anything, which finally proves that he really is in the bottom four percent of dogs. This put me in the position of having to be the one guy disciplining his dog in the park, which is never attractive. Eventually I gave up and put the leash on Herbie while Dizzie continued to waddle awkwardly around the park.

All in all, I survived the date with at least a few shreds of dignity intact, and my date never fled in revulsion. I also never sensed any real chemistry between us, which left me wondering if that's even possible on a first date. Perhaps my first date icebreakers need work, but the conversation inevitably turned to those small-talk standbys of "where are you from/what do you do?" which make it feel more like a job interview than a potential romantic liaison. I left the date realizing I have no idea what the reasonable metrics of success are for a date. I drove home with the radio off trying to process whether I bombed or aced the test. Is the first date's function simply to weed out psychopaths and to establish interest in a second date and chemistry develops (if it's going to) by date four? Or is it reasonable to expect chemistry at the first meeting? Should my goal be to go on more first dates to find that elusive first-date chemistry, or should my goal to be to go on more third dates to give that chemistry a chance to develop over time?

That's all for now.

****

For those of you reading me through the "Face Book", you can read all my older posts some lazy afternoon when you have nothing better to do at my blog. I just added a list of the editor's picks of my best ever posts. For you long time fans (thanks, Mom and Donald) feel free to suggest any posts that I omitted that should make the best list.

Survivor Preparedness: Outgoing

2011-08-21T16:15:00.000-04:00

My lack of Outgoingness might be what eventually keeps me from getting on Survivor. On the Myers Briggs I recently had to take for work, I was as far on the introversion scale as the test allowed. That said, I certainly have social needs and enough social intelligence to occasionally insert myself into groups of friends. One teacher I work with declined to believe that I was introverted because he had seen me be obnoxious and gregarious at various after-hours events. After careful explanation about the distinctions between introversion and hermitism, he grudgingly conceded that I might be an introvert. A close college friend once called me "dynamic but awkward," which is about right for describing my particular brand of Outgoing.

I've recently, however, had cause to try to increase my Outgoing quotient. My girlfriend of seven years and I decided it was time to end the romantic aspect of our relationship, so for the first time in my adult life my reality coincides with what I've always put on government forms: single. I was fairly confident before the breakup that my introversion and self-reliance (over self-reliance?) would insulate me from any major social or emotional impact, so I was unprepared for the unexpected boredom and loneliness of bachelordom.

I quickly realized two things about my closest friends in San Antonio: 1) They all work with me. 2) They are all in committed relationships, which means I am the one that makes the number of people in the group odd. Neither of these things means that my friends are any less supportive or fun. It does mean that I have little escape from work, and couples in groups naturally default to quiet conversations with their partners, so if I let my introverted side control my thinking, I can feel like I am constantly crashing the various mini-parties of two at any given event. One thing about introverts is that we need to feel thoroughly invited and welcome to any event. I have had to expand my comfort zone to make myself feel at ease as the third, fifth, or seventh wheel at any given outing.

All of this led me to realize that while I can continue to grow more comfortable with my altered role in my current friendships, I need to make an effort to build new relationships, preferably with people that don't have the same job as me. Recently, the New Yorker had an interesting article on internet dating. Before, as someone in a committed relationship, I had always seen internet dating as the last resort for people that don't know how to meet real people in real life. Becoming single, I realized I was one of those people that has no idea where to go to meet real people in real life. The New Yorker piece reassured me that really no one in my generation knows how to do this, and that internet dating is as viable a solution as any.

I created a profile on one of the free sites the New Yorker seemed to sanction, and I began reading an embarrassing number of profiles. Most profiles have so little written substance that it is impossible to differentiate one profile from another except by the pictures. The pictures are often either glaringly unflattering - generally a web-cam picture or a picture of themselves in the bathroom mirror with a cell phone camera - or so cropped, photoshopped and flattering that it is hard to tell how closely the picture might coincide with reality. I tend to like the pictures that seem like they were taken by friends and friends are in the picture with the woman; having people willing to take and be in your photo seems to vouch for some level of normalcy.

The main profile essay is a difficult writing assignment that proves too difficult for many on the site. The main problem that most people face is that their sense of self is so immediately obvious to them that they don't see the need of explaining it to the strangers they are hoping to meet, and are actually annoyed with the website for asking them to try. A typical profile would say something like, "I hate filling these things out. I'm just a down-to-earth girl that likes to have fun. lol! don't hate me, but I won't reply if you're not in shape. i know i sound awful saying that, but i'm just being honest."

Maybe I shouldn't have been, but I was surprised by the number of women my age with young children on the site (the women are on the site, not their children.) These women are either defiant in their profiles about this fact - "my children are the most important thing in my life and don't message me if you can't deal with that" - or they are coy and slip in their children in an off-hand way in some ancillary question hidden at the bottom of the profile. Also, there are a surprising number of women who describe themselves as "swearing like a sailor." As far as I can tell, this is in no way prompted by the site, but a spontaneous volunteering of information from countless random women. I think they say it try to communicate some level of being able to "hang with the guys." The way the site is set up, I can't read other men's profiles, but I somehow doubt any men describe themselves this way, as it is generally assumed that men will swear like sailors.

Amidst the hundreds of unhelpful profiles are many that seem to represent well-adjusted, attractive young women that I would like to meet. I might have just continued the pseudo-voyeurism of reading countless profiles and pining anonymously, but the website is good about constantly reminding me that I should send messages to women that I find interesting, so I eventually started to send little witty notes to various women. It was kind of like time-travel back to 6th grade and the earliest days of the internet when almost everyone I interacted with was anonymous. This was before Facebook made it possible to only interact with people I know in the real world, and the internet was dominated by anonymous chat rooms. Those chat rooms were all filled with desperately horny men asking everyone "asl" (or "age/sex/location" for you kids that weren't around in those bad old days) trying to find the only woman or person claiming to be a woman in the forum to sequester them into a private chat room. Even at that time, I only typed my messages in complete sentences, refusing the expediency of prollys and g2gs for what I thought was eloquence in a vain attempt for anyone to acknowledge how erudite and witty I was.

So back in the present, I started little conversations with these basically anonymous women, trying to find some aspect that had caught my eye on their profile to discuss. After a time, women also started messaging me and I would reply to all of them at first, but then gradually more selectively. Also, after about a week on the site, I received this surprising message:

We just detected that you're now among the most attractive people on [this site.]

We learned this from clicks to your profile and reactions to you in [the site's matching games.] Did you get a new haircut or something?
Well, it's working!

This flattering news resulted in the site displaying more profiles of women who are also considered "hot," which was a noticeable improvement. After a time, my conversations even with the "hot" women would run their course, as they inevitably would between two strangers with no shared experience, and I realized I was supposed to actually ask these women on dates. Not entirely believing the site's designation for me, I thought I would play it safe and ask three women out, figuring that would give me some chance of a positive reply. One woman I felt confident about because she had messaged me first, but she was the first to reject me. The other two accepted and I had suddenly accidentally made two dates for myself on two consecutive days. I have never been on a date with a woman that I did not first have a relationship with, so the prospect of two consecutive dates with perfect strangers filled me with mortal terror, and a realization that I should have waited a couple months before trying this. That said, I was on a mission to get out of my comfort zone and meet new people, and I thought even atrocious dates would be a learning experience, so I charged gamely ahead.

I wasn't sure what to do with the news of my impending dates. I was balancing the embarrassment of using an online dating site and the need to ask my friends what people were supposed to do on dates. What do strangers talk about over dinner? I've watched many comedic takes on bad dates on film and TV, but very few good ones. Are all first dates really farces and I should just roll with the punches, or should I try to do the opposite of everything in those scenes? Eventually, I unloaded on a friend several hours before the first date, and her complete dumfounded surprise at this out of character behavior for me did little to ease my stress.

I had asked the first date to my favorite Italian restaurant that also featured Jazz and belly dancing, as this seemed the sort of place that you're supposed to take dates. As I called to make reservations that night, it turned out this restaurant was actually closed forever. This seemed an ominous portent, but I patted myself on the back for calling ahead, and I texted her a new restaurant: a Thai place closer to me. I showered, shaved, dressed, drank a malty beverage for courage, and brushed my teeth.

I tried very hard to wait long enough to leave the house to get there at least a few minutes late, but fortuitous traffic lights conspired against me to make me exactly on time. I reached for my phone to help me kill time, but it wasn't there. The phone had died during the day, which it never does, and I had left it charging at home. Now I could go into the restaurant exactly on time and phone-less, or I could race home to get it and show up to the date thirty minutes late. My compulsive punctuality prevailed and I walked into the restaurant, asking for a table for two. The restaurant was fairly large, so when they tried to show me to a table, I asked to stay seated by the hostess' podium at the door so I wouldn't miss the date coming in. After ten minutes of waiting, the annoyed hostess told me she could seat me at a table facing the main entrance, and I could order a drink while I waited, so I relented and entered the restaurant.

Now at this point, I've been rambling on for so long that it seems safe to believe that only my closest friends and family are probably reading, which is good because we're getting to the embarrassing part.

I ordered a Japanese beer and slowly sipped it while watching Sports Center on a TV that I could almost hear and fiddling with the menu I had already read through thoroughly so the waitress wouldn't bother me. I drank slowly because I didn't want to have an empty beer in front of me when my date walked in. Eventually, after a series of increasingly frustrated passes from the waitress, I ordered an appetizer, figuring that when the date showed up it might be nice to have out while she chose her meal. When it was thirty minutes past when the date was supposed to start, I realized I probably should have driven to get my phone, but now it was certainly too late to go back.

I started doing various calculations in my head as I watched my fried spring rolls get cold of how long it was appropriate to wait before eating them. How strange would it be to enter a date where there was a finished appetizer in front of the gentlemen with whom you had expected to dine? At the forty-five minute mark, I started taking small nibbles. At the hour mark I relented and started taking big bites. It was certainly embarrassing sitting at a table by myself with chatting couples surrounding me, but I had been so stressed out about the prospects of actually being on a date that when I finally concluded that there was no chance of the date showing up, I was incredibly relieved. When I was finished with my spring rolls I asked for the check, deciding I had waited the appropriate amount of time. As I got up from the table, the small old lady who co-owns the restaurant said, "She didn't show up?" I replied, "Yup," and walked out of the restaurant.

The next day, the date texted me, ready to go. I informed her that the date had been the previous night. She asked if I still wanted to go, and I declined, deciding someone who is compulsively punctual shouldn't try to date someone that confuses Thursdays with Fridays. Besides, that night was supposed to be my second date in two days, so I actually did have plans. Being so nervous about the first date, however, I hadn't really followed up much with the second date that week to make sure that everything was still on, so she had made other plans.

I spent a couple weeks nursing my pride before accepting an invitation for a date from another woman. This time I suggested a dog park, which seemed like a place I could be more comfortable than a dimly lit restaurant. Also, it is much less conspicuous to be stood up at a dog park than a restaurant. A work commitment popped up at the last minute for her, but my phone was working, so I at least knew ahead of time.

So my current record for internet dating is 0 for 3, but it does seem like a viable way to meet women moving forward, and if nothing else it has boosted my confidence having women show some interest in me, even if only in a virtual way so far. So if any of the judges for Survivor contestants are reading this, I may not be totally there yet, but I am certainly trying to be more Outgoing.

Survivor Preparedness: Mentally and Physically Adept

2011-04-22T13:55:00.004-04:00

I've sat down several times to try to continue this series of Survivor posts, but I've realized that I may be too modest to recall stories that highlight my aptitude in these Survivor Virtues. Strong Willed was easy enough to come up with a self-deprecating story illustrating my innate stubbornness, but for Mentally and Physically Adept I might as well start bragging that I can eat fifty eggs (which I can.) I have the hardest time boasting that I can balance a ladder on my chin (I have) or can wrestle a man three times my size to the ground (easily) without burning with the innate Episcopalian knowledge that the meek shall be first. With all necessary preamble and prevarication aside, however, I can think of a time when I was definitively Mentally and Physically Adept.

I was with my group of college friends finishing another dinner in the Grinnell dining hall in which topics of discussion and argument ranged amicably from economics to who would win in a fight: a monkey with a knife or a bear. Regardless of the topic or my knowledge thereof, I spoke authoritatively, so it came as a great surprise to me that when the topic of squirrel habitat came up, my assertions that they made nests in trees were not believed as fact. One of my more vocal friends insisted that they lived in the holes found in many trees, and I argued that there were not nearly enough of these holes to sustain the vast number of squirrels on our small campus where the health and rot of trees were carefully maintained.

As I looked from face to face of my doubting friends, I felt like Galileo or Copernicus, abused and scoffed at in their own time only to be ultimately vindicated by empirical science. I might have said something to that effect, which strangely did not help my case. As we left the dining hall, I was insistent on finding a squirrel nest to show everyone. It took a little searching, but I found one about thirty feet up in a tree and pointed it out to the skeptics. They squinted up at the mess of sticks and leaves and were not convinced by my insistence that a squirrel or squirrels would be willing to dwell within. It became increasingly clear that only one choice remained.

As I climbed up towards the mess of sticks sitting high above me, pangs of doubt started to creep in. My friends were a knowledgable bunch, and rarely would they all argue against me unless it was one of the very few times that I was actually in error. Perhaps this nest belonged to a particularly large bird. While I did not relish the thought of surprising a squirrel at home, at least squirrels are soft furry creatures without talons or a beak. Nevertheless, the scoffing and disbelieving looks below spurred me upwards.

Scarcely had I poked my head up past the branch where the nest sat did the squirrel residing within decide that I was headed towards its home and it was time to evacuate. The squirrel lept inches from my face, nearly making me jump out of the tree in surprise. I did manage to safely descend, though less quickly than the squirrel, and readied myself for the mass eating of crow at the base of the tree.

My friends seemed instantly forgetful that they had ever argued against squirrels living in nests, and that even if they had, it was such a silly and trivial matter. They were much more interested in discussing the look on my face when the squirrel lept past it. Having just scraped my legs and arms, risked broken bones and death in a harrowing climb up thirty feet of oak all in the interested of science and truth, I begged to differ, but I let the matter pass until the next time they doubted something I said, when I would remind them of my inarguable rightness on the squirrel occasion.

Survivor Preparedness: Strong-Willed

2011-03-20T13:03:00.000-04:00

Since its first season, part of my life plan has been to be a contestant on the first and greatest reality television show, Survivor. I've been contemplating it so long that it is inevitable that it will eventually happen, so I will use this blog to help me prepare.

First, I will have to apply. Right now they are between seasons in their casting cycle, so they are not accepting applications, but I have found an old one online that they have used for the past several seasons (I know this because I periodically check, and this is the same application I have found for the past several years.) The application starts by listing all of the various legal and age requirements, which it seems that I already meet. So far, so good.

Next the application lists the principle qualities they say they will use to select their cast: Strong-Willed, Outgoing, Adventurous, Physically and mentally adept, Adaptable to new environments, Interesting lifestyles, backgrounds and personalities. Having watched the show, it seems that they rarely cast contestants that excel in every one of these categories, but rather usually in just one or two. However, to hedge my bets, I better make sure I excel in all of them. I'm going to try to devote a post to each quality, so let's start with Strong-Willed.

When I'm working with students, my Strong-WIlledness manifests as patience. I can outlast any 12 year-old in a battle of wills, so I am happy to wait until the student comes to see my side of things. See my last post for an example of this. Occasionally (frequently?) my Strong-Willedness manifests as being stubborn, which I think in some part can be credited to my father.

As I was growing up, a continuing source of contention between myself and my father was the state of order or lack thereof in my room. He maintained that my room should remain clean, and I was willing to keep my door closed so that he, if he so chose, could imagine that it was. He did not so choose, so the room remained a sensitive matter between us.

My father frequently applied economic incentives to parenting, and my allowance was made contingent on the cleanliness of my room, and fairly so. This generally worked well enough, as what child or teenager does not appreciate spending money. The only problem with this approach was that if the room reached the tipping point where the task of cleaning it no longer seemed worth the cash reward, at which point I would simply forfeit the allowance.

One time, after several months of forfeiting my allowance, my father reached a tipping point of his own and sent me a letter. Regretfully, I do not have this letter any more, so I will have to do my best to recreate it from memory. I doubt that I will come close to the original, but I will try to capture the tone and content as faithfully as possible:

Dear Mr. David P. Churchman,

In that the room you currently occupy does not conform to the expectations of cleanliness in this house, and in that the loss of allowance does not appear to be sufficiently motivating, it has come to the point where additional action must be taken. If the aforementioned room does not meet satisfactory inspection by the last day of this month, January of 2002, then driving privileges of the Geo Prism that have been previously granted will be revoked until such time as the room does meet satisfactory inspection.

Sincerely,

Mr. John H. Churchman

After reading this letter (or one much like it) cleaning my room became a complete impossibility. At the time I was taking a class that met earlier than the school bus could get me to school, so I asked him if I would still be allowed to drive to and from school. I was. I asked if I had a social engagement if he was planning to drive me or if I would need to beg a ride off of my friends. He allowed that I would be allowed to use the car for social engagements. As best I could tell, my car privileges would be revoked largely in name only. However, I still needed a plan where I neither cleaned my room nor ceded any level of freedom recently granted to me by being able to drive.

I was at a strategic disadvantage. Both the room and the car belonged to him, so I could not argue that he had no right. While I was financially dependent on him, I had a difficult time thinking of anything that I held over him. So, I sent a letter to my father that went something like this:

Dear Mr. Churchman

In that Mr. David Churchman (heretofore referred to in the first person) finds the loss of driving privileges to be an unjust action on the part of Mr. John Churchman (heretofore referred to as my father), I am driven to take action against such a drastic measure. If on January 31 my driving privileges are revoked, I will regretfully no longer attend Churchman family dinners until such time as said privileges are reinstated by my father.

Sincerely,

Mr. Churchman

This gambit both infuriated my father and caused Mom to come in to negotiate a truce. I am not sure if it was because of how unfair I thought my father was being, how frustrated I was with how calm my father stayed during the conversation, an inopportune surge of hormones, or some combination of the three, but I sobbed through the talks. I tearfully agreed to cook dinner once a week for the family in exchange for my mother occasionally straightening up my room. I am embarrassed to admit that my mother cleaned my room when I was 16, but I think it does help to illustrate my Strong Will, if not my cleanliness.

A typical interrogation

2011-03-18T12:09:00.003-04:00

So...

Alec, would it be possible that you threw the spitball sitting on the floor in the back of the classroom? Well, I hate to even ask, and normally I wouldn't, but I have eye witness testimony that it came from your corner of the classroom. I came over here and looked to see who it might be, and you were not the first person I thought of by any means, but I couldn't help but notice the spitball that is nearly identical in size, shape and proportion to the one I saw on the floor over there concealed in your hand right now.

Oh, my mistake, I didn't realize that this wadded up wet piece of paper in your hand was not a spitball. What, may I ask, is that in your hand? Okay, let me reframe my initial question. Would it be possible that you threw a piece of chewed up paper towards the back of the room?

Okay, let me ask a different question then. Do you see why I, the teacher, responsible for keeping a clean and orderly classroom environment, might want to know who threw that spitball, and in that quest for knowledge might happen to walk to this corner of the room that eyewitnesses directed me towards, and ask if you, Alec, knew anything about the spitball that looks identical to the piece of paper that you are now chewing on? Now you know I try not to prejudge students based on their established reputations, so don't get me wrong here, but do you see why, Alec, I am asking if you personally know anything about that spitball in the back of the room?

So it is your spitball? Well, if you did not throw it, do you have any knowledge about how it might have ended up on the floor in the back of the classroom? I see, and what would you call that motion? Would you object to me calling that rolling it? So would it be fair for me to say that you rolled a wadded piece of chewed up paper to the back of the classroom?

Now, Alec, knowing that you personally rolled that piece of chewed up paper, I am curious about your response to my first question. I can understand that you were confused since you did not throw any spitballs, only rolled chewed up pieces of paper, but when I initially asked about the spitball, did you know that I was referring to the chewed up piece of paper that you rolled to the back of the room? Do you see how it might have made both of our lives easier if you had just mentioned this fact from the outset?

Now we both know I have to do something about this, so pick up fifty pieces of trash and we'll call it even.

Responsibility, Part 4 (the finale)

2011-03-17T18:47:00.006-04:00

While we waited, I heard the receptionist have the same conversation half a dozen times she had on the phone with me two hours earlier. "Yes, we're open. The initial exam is $85, and after that I can't tell you anything. I can't give you any medical advice over the phone about that, all I can recommend is that you come in to get the initial exam, which is $85. I don't know what the doctor will recommend after that, each doctor is different. The initial exam is $85, and after that the doctor may recommend any number of treatments. No, I can't give an estimate on what that would be, but the initial exam is $85. Yes, it could be a few hundred dollars, or over a thousand," and so on.

The five-hundred dollar tests had me brooding, and each time I heard the receptionist go into her spiel again, I became more cynical. It seemed like they were luring people in the door with a reasonably priced initial exam, just to spring the expensive tests on them when they find out their animal is dying. I became convinced the hospital was preying on people at their most vulnerable. Emily didn't share my cynicism. She reasoned that most of the people that were coming in or calling didn't seem to be able or willing to pay, so the cool monotonous loop of the receptionist was justified.

The second time they took us into the adjoining exam room, they showed us x-rays of Herbie's chest. Apparently the murky white cloud sitting within the slightly less murky cloud represented blood in his lungs. The blood tests showed that he had only 35,000 whatsits when he is supposed to have 70,000. All of the tests pointed to rat poison, which the doctor suspected from the moment she heard he was vomiting blood. Coughing blood, I corrected. The doctor explained that this was very common, and not to blame ourselves, and left within a minute of entering.

We waited in the exam room for the next doctor who came with the invoice. Herbie needed a blood transfusion, maybe two. He needed Vitamin K, which is the antidote for rat poison, an IV, one of those plastic radar dish collars to keep him from chewing at the IV and some time in an Oxygen chamber. He needed to spend at least two nights at the vet for observation. This bill itemized everything that they could possibly need to treat Herbie, down to $4 for dog food for two days. All together, it was over $1,000, which took the air out of the room. We asked to discuss it alone.

I didn't know where to begin the conversation. We were trying to save money for our upcoming trip to Orlando. Emily has been paying double rent since she started spending the week up in Austin for he job, not to mention student loans for law school. A thousand dollars is no small sum. Herbie has been endlessly annoying since we got him. He has made countless messes on the floor, and eaten or chewed on every conceivable item in our house. He has punched my loved ones and myself in the crotch hundreds of times as he enthusiastically greets us at the door. With $1000 we could adopt and pay the vet bills for four or five dogs better than Herbie.

Emily silently considered all of this, and said, "I don't have a choice. He's an idiot, but he's mine." Which I suppose is what I've been getting at since starting these posts on Monday. I have been endlessly fleeing Responsibility only to find that I have been snared in a deep one to this dog. Emily has been on the opposite path, seeking out more and deeper responsibilities to serve her community and family. Emily's sense of Responsibility is so immediate and intuitive that no deliberation was needed.

We hugged for a while, and went up to the receptionist at the front to pay the invoice. They took us to the back to see Herbie one last time before leaving. We had been planning to camping the next day, and we asked if there was any chance they would want to discharge him early, and the doctor said they definitely wanted to hold him the full forty-eight hours.

After returning from the camping trip, we picked up Herbie and a bottle of Vitamin K. His coughing completely dissipated by Monday, and he's back to being as completely obnoxious as ever. The only evidence of his adventure is a small pink stain on his kennel's lining where he spat up the last drops of blood on his return, and a shaved patch on his arm where they gave him his blood transfusion.

The End.

***

Thank you for bearing with me on these longer than usual posts, and I appreciate those of you commenting your encouragement along the way. Also, that x-ray is not actually Herbie, if any of you are doctors and there is something unrelated wrong with that dog.

Responsibility, Part 3

2011-03-16T11:16:00.004-04:00

The animal emergency room did not instill great comfort. A surly receptionist buzzed us in and took our information. "Dog's name? Age? Breed? Are his vaccinations current? Normal veterinarian? Symptoms? Has your dog gotten into any poison or cleaners?"

Well, he had busted into the laundry room one day when I was at work. The back door must not have latched all the way. While he was in there, he opened up a package of paper towels and ripped four rolls completely to shreds. He also found a few packages of sunscreen and chewed on them, but he didn't seem to be able to get any sunscreen out. We did have some rat poison out, but I couldn't tell if Herbie had eaten any because that the was the trap the rats had eaten so plentifully from before.

But that was almost two weeks ago. I had kept a close eye on both dogs for the next few days, and neither of them seemed worse for the wear. I had just taken them to frisbee just the other night, and they voraciously chased tennis balls for at least 30 minutes.

"It's $85 for the initial exam. I'll take your dog back there. If you'll please be seated the doctor will be right with you." In the waiting room with us were two children, happily playing with their dog's favorite squeaky toy. A veterinary infomercial played on a short loop on the TV above us. Intermittently we could hear Herbie's patented whine wafting to us from the back.

Shortly after taking him back, the receptionist came back and told us they were going to keep him back there as his temperature was 104 degrees. At about the same time, Emily and I both realized we had no idea what his temperature should be. Apparently 101 to 102 degrees is normal.

While Emily and I were waiting, a young woman brought in a golden retriever whose skin sagged loosely against its visible bones. It had cloudy cataracts in both eyes and had difficulty walking up through the door when they were buzzed in. In the questionnaire, the woman said the dog was four years old. After the $85 deposite was paid, they took the ancient looking retriever in the back, and the young woman sat by herself in front of us, staring stoically ahead.

I found myself judging this woman with the pathetic dog. How could she let her animal get to such a state? Where was her sense of Responsibility? Of course, maybe I poisoned my dog. (But the rat poison still seemed unlikely to me. It was two weeks ago, and surely Herbie's tiny digestive and circulatory system had completely processed everything in his body several times since then?)

Next, a father came in with his ten year old son clutching a chihuahua wrapped in a blanket to his chest. The chihuahua couldn't have been more than three or four pounds, and it pathetically trembled in the boy's arms. (Though chihuahuas tend to tremble, so maybe rather than pathetically trembling, it was characteristically trembling.) The man had let his larger dog play with the chihuahua, and the chihuahua might be paralyzed now. He had "forgotten" his credit card, so he couldn't pay the $85. He told his son they would come back in the morning with his mother as they walked out. The boy clutching the dog never said a word.

I awaited the third doggy-harbinger of doom, as any classic story would have a third, but after an hour they let us into one of the adjoining exam rooms. We stared at an American Kennel Club poster of all the types of official pure-breeds and speculated as to which Herbie had the greatest resemblance. I thought the Parson Russell Terrier had about the right proportions, but the coat was too long.

The doctor came in and told us they were pretty sure it was the rat poison. Rat poison causes bleeding, so they think the coughing is a result of bleeding into the lungs. Also, he had some bruises on his legs that are characteristic of rat poisoning. Okay, but it was almost two weeks ago? It can sometimes take several days for symptoms to manifest. We'll need to run this blood work and take x-rays of his chest to be sure. Here's the estimate; pay that at the front desk and we'll get started right away.

Emily and I were left with a piece of paper that said they wanted $500 to run tests to prove something of which they already seemed pretty certain. I, however, was still by no means certain. I still held onto some scrap of belief that maybe Herbie just had a cold. The doctor hadn't addressed, after all, how rat poison could cause Herbie to have so much phlegm. Emily grimly paid the receptionist for the tests while I babbled about Herbie's small circulatory system and how fast his heart beats, and we sat to wait again.

It was hard to know what to talk about as we waited. Rather immediately we exhausted what we knew about Herbie and what we thought might happen. Emily had been gone all week at her job in Austin, so we had the normal catching up to do, though telling anecdotes about misbehaving children or colorful defendants seemed awkward in the somber waiting room. We would occasionally look knowingly at each other as we heard Herbie's whine waft in from the back room and then drift back to silence.

***

Well, I honestly thought that I would be able to finish the story in this installment, but rather than exercise my characteristic concision, my Spring Break is inspiring me to loquacity, for which I apologize if you're bored to tears. Part 4 to follow.

Responsibility, Part 2

2011-03-15T15:50:00.003-04:00

Continued from Responsibility, Part 1

I realized this week that the grim spectre that I have been fleeing these past few years has not been adulthood. I actually rather like being an adult. I enjoy adult conversations, the respect and freedom afforded adults, and the occasional adult beverage. If nothing else, the money is much better. I have escaped the frustrations and limitations of childhood, and I still have a few years before I start to become limited again by my own body's slow betrayal.

That dark presence that whispers down the back of my neck and keeps me up at night is not adulthood; it is Responsibility. Certainly I have had to deal with small responsibilities throughout my life. I am responsible to have enough money in my bank account so that my rent check clears. I have countless responsibilities to tend to in my teaching and team leading positions at school. But ultimately, if the check bounces or if one more student doesn't learn math as well as she should have, I will still be able to live with myself.

Friday morning, I showered, I got dressed for school, and I went to let Herbie and Dizzy out of their kennels. Dizzy came out in a flash with a few of her titular spins, but Herbie stayed in his crate. This was unprecedented for Herbie, enthusiastic slayer of chicken and rat. I urged Herbie out, and he tenderly trotted to the door to be let out. Each breath, however, was joined by a wet cough. Later, when he calmed down, he stopped coughing, but rather than darting around beneath my feet all morning, he looked sadly up at me from his chair. Most troubling was when I put his food out, he didn't go to eat it. I hand fed him a little, and he subsequently ate the rest without goading, which was encouraging.

I decided Herbie must have caught a cold or pneumonia from being left out in the cold a few too many days. He has a house in the backyard that he will spoon Dizzy in when it gets too cold, but maybe that wasn't as effective as I had previously thought. I decided to risk the wrath of Herbie's minuscule bladder and left him inside for the day as I went to work, hoping that a day's rest inside would cure his malady. I fretted about him all morning, and used my planning period to come back and check up on him. He was still coughing when he got excited, but when I let him out, he made a normal looking stool. So I decided that he was not going to keel over while I was at work, I went back to finish my day. When I came home again, there appeared to be no change for the worse or better.

I took the monsters out for a trial walk. Herbie usually pulls his leash with every ounce of strength that his eighteen pounds of wiry muscle affords him in a desperate attempt to fulfill his lifelong mission of being one more foot in front of me. (On previous walks, I have contemplated posting about Herbie's life philosophy. I think it is slightly Daoist, in that he is not concerned about which path he takes, but with some sort of American, bootstraps twist in that he will give his 110% regardless of the course.) On Friday's walk, Herbie walked slowly behind me. After half a block, Herbie stopped for a coughing fit. After coughing and gagging for thirty seconds, he released a giant glob of phlegm on the grass, covered in blood and spit.

Anyone who has watched any romantic movie set in the 19th century knows the ending as soon as a protagonist starts coughing blood. I reasoned with myself that if Herbie had been coughing all day, it could have irritated something in his throat or lungs. It might even be a good sign that he is getting out all of this phlegm that had been building up. It wasn't even that much blood. On the way back we stopped three more times, and each time there was less phlegm and more blood.

Emily was not due back from Austin for another hour or so, but I called her to make sure that I called the right vet. It was after hours, but a night receptionist answered, listened to Herbie's symptoms, took my number and told me that a doctor would call me back and tell me what to do. I figured the doctor would just listen to the symptoms and decide Herbie just had a bad cold and needed a little water and rest. Already I felt like Herbie was starting to look better as he gagged more blood onto my hardwood floor. Waiting for the doctor, I tried to keep Herbie calm and I microwaved a frozen dinner. (I get hungry when I'm anxious.)

As I was waiting for this doctor to call me back, (I'm still waiting, VCA Oak Hills) Emily came home, watched Herbie cough blood once, and told me we needed to go to a hospital right away because her dog was coughing blood. When she put it that way, it seemed so obvious. Some lethal combination of optimism and inertia had held me in the grips of inaction while a life entrusted to me was giving me the most graphic possible communication that it was dying. I had failed miserably in my Responsibility to this dog, and one look at myself through Emily's eyes found me lacking. We drove Herbie to the closest animal emergency room, while Herbie courteously refrained from bleeding on the back seat of Emily's car.

***

I did not plan to go on and on quite so much, so I am forced to pause again until Part 3, which will conclude Herbie's story.

A Brief Intermission

2011-03-15T10:17:00.002-04:00

Part 2 will come, but I just found this promotional video for the place I've worked almost every summer for the last ten years. A highlight for all my fans is a brief clip of me jamming on the squeezebox at around the three minute mark.

Responsibility, Part 1

2011-03-14T19:58:00.013-04:00

Upon first entering the adult work force a few years ago, it seemed that there was really very little separating me from these "grown-ups" with whom I had suddenly found myself spending my days. I was able to complete adult tasks, hold adult conversations, and I came to think that after these many years of considering myself a child, I might now be one of them. Having spent so much time playing with kids at summer camp, I thought I had taken adequate precautions to stave off this troubling condition, but it had become so that I could see no difference between myself and individuals that I could not help but identify as adult.

Fleeing adulthood through summer camp.

This realization in mind, I quickly fled the country in a desperate and self-indulgent trip in the hopes of maintaining my quickly fleeting youth. En route, I committed myself to a year with an organization sure to be full of other man-children fugitive from the grim spectre of grown-upness. My year with this organization left me feeling crotchety and cynical, feeling the urge to sit on a porch and bitterly philosophize about the inadequacy of the upcoming generation of youth whom I had worked with during that year. Seeing little separating me from the generation ahead of me and feeling no connection to the generation following me, I had little to do but admit that I may in fact be a grown-up.

Fleeing adulthood through international travel.

Fleeing adulthood through a year at an immature organization.

As a grown-up, I suddenly had grown-up duties. For example, living in old houses in San Antonio means that when it starts to get cold outside, what normally lives outdoors decides not to anymore, and I have to deal with courteously escorting any unwelcome guests off the premises. Prejudiced though it may be, my least welcome guests this winter were rats.

I only ever saw one, which introduced himself around five o'clock some morning as I was getting ready for school. I heard rattling and squeaking coming from the kitchen. Not awake enough to feel particularly brave, I slowly opened the kitchen door to pinpoint the noise. It was clearly coming from the oven, and I contemplated how a rat could possibly have gotten in the oven, which made me realize that I know very little about what the inside of my oven even looks like. However, I decided that it was unlikely that the rat had made it into the main chamber, and was more likely in the tray below. The large amount of rattling seemed to confirm this suspicion.

At this point I was presented with a conundrum. The rat sounded panicked and trapped. If it remained trapped, it was possible that if I did nothing the rat would die, and I could deal respectfully with its carcass at a later time. However, if it were to somehow break free, I would have stood by and done nothing while a malevolent invader made himself at home in my house. I slowly came to the realization that I would have to open the drawer to that oven.

Which brought me to my second conundrum. If I opened the drawer, what could I possibly do to ensure that the rat would not jump on my face, give me rabies, and safely escape to some happy rat nest in my home. I considered various schemes involving brooms, bags, and boxes, but settled on a more darwinian plan. Also living in my house (and slightly more welcome than the rats) is a monster bred specifically for this sort of situation.

A few weeks previous, Herbie had proven his lethality at a barbecue in my friend's backyard. Talking with her boyfriend who also had a small dog, he assured me that his dog had escaped from every conceivable fence but was stymied by the one in his girlfriend's backyard; I had nothing to fear letting Herbie run around untethered. This went well for about an hour, until Herbie realized that my friend's neighbor keeps chickens, at which point it took Herbie all of fifteen seconds to be in their yard with a dead chicken in his mouth.

Herbie: Chicken-Killer.

With this in mind, I led Herbie into the kitchen, planning to slowly open the oven drawer and drive the rat towards his slavering jaws. He was a rat-terrier; this was his destiny. Ignoring me building up the courage to open the dreaded drawer, Herbie immediately dove in behind the oven, where the rat actually lay writhing in a trap the landlord had left unbeknownst to me. Herbie darted into the living room and shook the rat vigorously in his mouth. The most remarkable part of this story is that when I asked him to drop his fairly-won prey, he did. The rat lay lifeless as I swept him into the old cereal box that I would soon pallbear into the outside trashcan.

I hoped that this rat may just be a lone wolf, separated from his tribe and desperate to try anywhere to live. In fact, he proved to be a scout, and I had failed to stop his report from making it back to his home-base. He was a martyr to his people, and they got their revenge by scratching at my walls just as I started to fall asleep. They would scratch and bite for about fifteen minutes and eventually stop. I would start to drift off, which they took as their cue to resume their excavations.

I immediately drove to the closest grocery store and bought every trap and poison that claimed to eliminate rats. I had been warned against using poisons before as it meant that the rats would die inside the walls and we would be unable to remove them. After discussing it with Emily, we decided we could stand the smell of dead rats more than the sound of live ones. After about a week, we saw evidence of initial nibbles and bites on our green poison until finally we saw evidence of a rat feast on one of our larger traps. A week later than that, the rancid smells wafted through our house and the tell-tale scratching disappeared.

***

Well, I have been going on for a while now, and I have yet to tell the story I sat down to tell. It is tempting to stop here on this moment of victory over nefarious invading forces, but it would not be the adult thing to do when there is a more pressing tale to tell. I will, however, have to split this post in twain. Let us hope that the second part follows quickly.

Neighborliness

2010-12-23T23:22:00.001-05:00

As I fly back to Churchmanor from my San Antonio outpost of Churchmanistan, I reflect on my Neighborliness. I fly back to where I grew up: a cheerful suburban neighborhood where I played happily with other neighbor children, and where my mother still exemplifies Neighborliness with long-lasting friendships with many neighbors and an eye out for the more elderly residents of our decreasingly humble neighborhood.

On this trip I will visit the church that played a prominent part in my "moral" education, (I will let the reader decide whether any of that education resulted in a suitably moral individual) where Neighborliness is a central theological tenet. When asked what made a neighbor, Jesus told the Good Samaritan Parable, which lends itself to a broad interpretation of a neighbor. Using Jesus' definition, I like to think I practice Neighborliness by dedicating a large part of my current life to service and teaching.

However, at a certain point Neighborliness must be extended to actual neighbors, by which I mean the people that live in close physical proximity. One of the reasons my mother recently added a porch to the front of Churchmanor is she believes porches increase Neighborliness. My current residence has a porch I frequently enjoy, so I can check off that box.

The other thing that helps me score Neighborliness points is the two monsters that I occasionally walk around the block. Any dog owner becomes a celebrity in their own neighborhood. I was a beneficiary of Neighborliness when the more athletic of the two monsters learned how to escape from his small backyard enclosure while I was at work. Herbie was uninjured after a day of playing in traffic largely because a neighbor conscientiously and futilely returned him to his enclosure several times. I came home to a note from the neighbor, a note from the mailman, and a happy and dirty dog in the front yard instead of the fenced-in backyard.

Yesterday my Neighborliness was tested. We have backyard neighbors in a tumultuous relationship that previously resulted in a pile of stuff burning in our shared parking area and more recently in the gentleman's brief arrest. I can't say I have done anything particularly Neighborly for this couple except the small courtesy of quietly trying not to make eye contact while the gentleman was handcuffed in my driveway as I entered my house last week.

Last night while I was getting ready to go out for dinner, the monsters started barking at the door, which in our house usually means the takeout has arrived. No one knocked but something caught my eye in the window and the monsters persisted in their uproar. I opened the door to find my backyard neighbors leaving my door. She asked me to please call the police because He would not leave. He wore no shirt, was bleeding slightly from several wounds in his chest, smelled of alcohol, and asked me to please not call the cops and that she was the one stabbing him with a knife.

In some ways, my current profession prepared me for this situation. A coworker of mine new to teaching and working with young adolescents made the dead-on analogy that sixth graders are like a group of friends at three AM on Saturday night: dangerously clumsy, inexplicably emotional, and irresponsible with a cell phone. Arbitrating between two irrational and upset parties is a daily task for me.

I talked with both of them for a while. I asked if She were to grab his shirt if He would agree to leave for now so that we did not need to call the police. With some wrangling as to what exactly He needed in order to leave (a shirt? a jacket? not the shirt He or She had ripped to shreds when either She stabbed him or He broke the window?) She threw out his stuff and locked herself back in her house while I continued to talk with Him. We talked for at least twenty minutes, him standing on the steps to my porch while I stood in the doorway.

He would get upset and ask me not to call the police and I would tell him that I didn't want to get in the middle of it or take sides, so why didn't he just go to a friend or family member's house for a while? He would tell me that his friend didn't get off work 'til eleven, and he didn't want his niece to see him like this because sometimes he gets money from babysitting her. He told me that She had gotten a protective order so if I called the cops they would throw him in jail. He told me that I knew how it was and that the "woman is always right, no matter what."

At a certain point he tried reverse psychology by telling me he wanted to use my phone so he could call the cops on her. I told him that this did not seem like a good idea because frankly He smelled like the bottle and He had told me that She had a protective order against him. He countered that He didn't know that for sure, that is just what the police had told him. It seemed to me that they would be in a position to know. I told him that I did not want to call the police, but that if he went back towards their apartment, I would feel obligated to. He said, fine he would leave, but he didn't want to carry around the large duffle bag She had brought out for him to get a shirt from.

I offered to bring the bag back to her as long as He promised to stay out front. I told him I would relay any message She had for him. I knocked on the door and gave her the bag and asked when to tell Him to come back for the bag. She said Monday, because she did not want to deal with it over the holidays. I was about to head back when he ambled back to us, and they shouted at each other through me for a while. I eventually shepherded Him back to my front porch.

We continued to talk, and at about the same time He introduced himself as Matthew, our conversation lost structural coherence (which makes it hard to summarize) and it was clear Matthew just needed to talk for a while. I will try to paraphrase:

I threw my pipe over here when she said she was going to call the cops; would you help me look?

No.

I just love her so much, but she makes me so angry I just want to kill her (please don't call the cops) but really she gets me so pissed off I want to kill her. Not really though, so don't call the cops.

I would rather not get involved or call the cops.

So you're saying that if you see me go back there, you will call the cops? But as long as you don't see me, you don't care, right?

I've got two dogs that bark at pretty much everything, so more than likely I'll hear you.

Okay, I was just kidding. I won't come back tonight. And if I did I would go over the back gate so you wouldn't hear me.

Look, I'd appreciate it if you didn't come back tonight. Why don't you walk down to the gas station and get some cigarettes and sober up until your friend gets off work?

Yeah, okay, but I don't have any money.

Here's five dollars to go buy some cigarettes.

Are you trying to bribe me to leave? Is this five dollars of your pity money?

It can be just a loan. You can pay me back whenever you want. You know where I live.

***

So Matthew left and I did end up calling the police since I was headed out to dinner and it was unclear whether Matthew was coming back or not. Anyways, I saw Matthew and Her happily smoking in the back today, so they seem to have reconciled.

I'm torn on what Neighborliness should have looked like in that situation. I feel more connected to Matthew having talked with him and now thinking and writing about him. I think if I see Matthew in handcuffs in my driveway again I won't be able to quietly avoid eye contact again.

The Magic of the Tedium

2010-09-03T20:28:00.002-04:00

I have not posted well about my teaching. I think part of it has to do with the glut of portrayals of teaching to choose from in the popular media, and how boring my own experience is when it is compared. Yes, I am teaching at-risk students in a dangerous part of a large city, and yes, my school (and hopefully I) will help these students make huge, life-changing growth. However, I do not get the benefit of a montage with a Coolio soundtrack. I will not be taking my students to win any competitions in their arrays of political correct diversity, and they will probably not be writing any NYT bestsellers with me. There is no magical story or moment that I can tell about when I said or did that magical thing that changed a student's life. Good teaching is inherently undramatic because to teach well is to be a master of the mundanity of your student's school days. The more consistent and reliable I am with this tedium, the more successful my students are. Teaching is more "Risk" than "Candyland." To illustrate, here is what I did before class started on Tuesday:

6:12 I Arrive at Aspire with two Diet Cokes in my hand. I unlock my desk, take out my laptop, turn it on. I tuck two sticky-notes with "Churchman" scribbled on them under the tabs of my Diet Cokes. I walk to the fridge and put my Diet Cokes in a spot where I hope they won't be stolen (teachers are lovely people, but sometimes their need for caffeine outweighs their humanity.)

6:13 I check my work email. 15 have come in since I left at 6:30 the night before. I reply to what I can, occasionally shouting out questions to my fellow early risers in the Teacher Tank, where all of our desks are arranged, and occasionally answering questions that are shouted out to me as I am able. One of the more pressing emails is from the school director (principal) telling us the schedule for our meetings on Wednesday. We will have 30 minutes with our departments to set up our online gradebooks together, 45 minutes with our grade level teams, and 30 minutes to help decorate the hallways for the plethora of visitors coming on Friday for our "First Friday" breakfast. I am responsible for running the 6th grade meeting, which I think I do a pretty good job of keeping moving at a brisk pace, but even still they tend to run 30 minutes past their allocated 60. 45 minutes does not seem like enough, but I patch together an agenda for Wednesday's meeting to the team with each item allocated a tight time limit. I think it might be feasible to finish in 45 minutes.

6:20 The school director approaches me at my desk with her vision of our Saturday School. It is well thought out, though it takes me a while and some of my own grappling with what she has planned to realize this. I start working on creating a schedule for the 6th grade teachers that will be working at Saturday Schools that won't get me lynched by my team.

6:53 I grab my copies for the day that I made yesterday (130 each of N3 (notes) and LW4 (lifework (homework)) and walk down a floor to my classroom. On my way in, I pick up the sharpener and pencils I gave to students the night before waiting for their parents to pick them up. These students are enthusiastic to have anything to do (except their lifework) and especially love sharpening pencils. I unlock the classroom and put my copies down. I take the brightly colored vocab word down from yesterday from the "Target" section of my white board, and move it to my "Word Wall" bulletin board on the other side of the room. On the way back across the room, I select the music for the day on my ipod (I settle on Brahms' Requiem because the Bach and Beethoven have been well received and they seem ready for something more out there.) I start playing it, and write the title and composer on my board in the "Now Playing" corner.

6:55 I trot down the hall to the reading teacher's room and grab my advisory (homeroom) students' mark cards (behavioral trackers they carry around) and Aspirations (self guided reading and math work to be completed during advisory.) On the way back, the new NFS (Non Fiction Studies (social studies)) teacher asks me a question about a student she had disciplined the day before. I gave her affirmation she made the correct choice in placing the student on "red card."

6:56 I trot back to my room and sort my mark cards in alphabetical order so I can place them on the desks for my advisory's assigned seats. I place the Aspirations on the shelf where students know to pick them up when they come in. I make a file for the day in Mr. Purple (a purple hanging file folder I created so students who missed a day of class can find their missing work.) I label manilla folders with N3 and LW4 and place the day's copies within. I go to my closet and grab two new vocab cards and a marker. I am careful to choose colors that won't clash in their position on the word wall. Today's words are "prime" and "composite." I place tape on the back of the words and grab four expo markers. I write each of the required elements of my whiteboard in a different Expo color. This is what my board looked like:

Target (black): What does it mean for a number to be "prime" or "composite"? (This is where I taped the brightly colored vocab cards.)
Objective (black): We will use rectangles to define "prime."
Stretch (blue): Check MW/LW.
Game Plan (green): Highlighting rectangles.
Frayer sheet on Prime.
Review LW.
Lifework (red): LW4 (I write the lifework in 18 inch tall letters because many of my students have trouble seeing the board but have difficulty getting glasses.)

7:01 I take out my bin of highlighters from the closet. I go around to the various desks and place one yellow highlighter in each for our rectangle activity. (Having all the same color will prevent disputes during the day.) My desks are the boxy kind that you can place your books inside, but I have them turned all the wrong direction. These desks have a tendency of accumulating trash otherwise, and it also has the added benefit of me being able to hide supplies like the highlighters as a surprise for later in the lesson. As I walk around the room, I straighten up the desks. Last year, I had a student come up to me after a class and tell me, "It is such a mess in here that I feel really nervous." This year, I have been pretty meticulous about getting the kids to take an investment in keeping the room clean by doing things like having my advisory boys do various chores every morning and having my classroom students always perfectly align their desks at the end of each class.

7:09 I realize I have forgotten an answer key to grade the Lifework in class with my students, so I quickly create one from a copy in Mr. Purple. I also take out the day's handouts to review what I need to do during the day.

7:14 My first advisory students start walking through the door to Brahms and my smile. They silently grab their Aspiration and walk to their desks, looking for their Mark Card.

Low Low Prices Back to School Sale!

2010-08-02T09:24:00.006-04:00

Dearest readers,

I have been severely delinquent in the past year or so, and for that I give all due apologies. I find it increasingly difficult to see myself as an ambassador in a foreign land as I aclimate both to the sunny clime and new challenges of the working world. I have always found benefit when I have stopped to reflect with a missive to the home country, but I frequently forget this and subsequently have left the Churchmanistani people severely underinformed.

I post this sitting in the airport waiting for my flight to Las Vegas, where I will join teachers and administrators from all around the country which happen to also work at charter schools with the same name as mine. There I will participate in some combination of rebrainwashing, professional development, and recreation (probably in that order.) As the conference (or "summit" as it likes to call itself) approaches (and quickly thereafter the new schoolyear) I cannot help but feel the dread that I have an overwhelmingly huge task before me this year. One of the reasons that I subject myself to teaching (and math in particular) is that it feels dreadfully important, but this importance is one of my largest stressors. I would (and most likely will) feel dreadful if I have any students that don't have firm mastery of 6th grade math by the end of the year and therefore lead lives of destitution, unable to calculate a tip or balance checkbook for the rest of their life. (Does anyone besides my dad still balance a checkbook?)

The more prefessional development I attend and the more I read, the more I realize all the multitudinous ways I can completely fail my students. Last year, much of the pressure I might have felt was largely aliened because of the difficult circumstances I had to teach under. If I did not succeed, surely these circumstances were more responsible than me for uncritical thinkers going out into the world. For my summer teaching, I was saddled with a mentor teacher I didn't get along with and a classroom full of 6th through 8th graders who had failed math already. During most of the year, I had no classroom of my own, and I was required to teach another teacher's curriculum in my small math class. When I finally did get my own classroom, I had only three months with my students. I was able to pass off any failures to the other seven months of teaching and take credit for any success.

This year, in contrast, as my school likes to put it (noticeably on an eight foot long banner hanging in my classroom) "No Excuses!" Now I have a classroom all to myself, with access to incredible resources, curriculum and mentors at a school with a history of overwhelming success with students that San Antonio's public schools routinely fail. As a teacher, I am expected to be a master of so many professions that to lack mastery in even one insures disaster. Let me highlight a few that have been keeping me up at night with dreams of showing up to class with no lesson plan and in my drawers:

* Interior decorator/set designer
* Performer/orator
* Child psychologist
* Mathematician
* Artist
* Statistician
* Father
* Mother
* Not at all a parent
* Detective
* Judge
* Mayor (occasionally imperial dictator)
* Custodian
* Manager
* Secretary
* Lunch lady
* Socratic questioner
* Answerer of questions
* Public Relations worker
* etc.

This post seems to be dragging on and on without much happening, so i will put it out of its misery with the hopes that having squeezed one out, many will follow (though if history is any guide, that is unlikely).

Nominated

2010-03-16T11:23:00.003-04:00

This is embarrassing, but I thought I should post that I was nominated by a peer for a teaching award. You can see the nomination here.

What makes a teacher?

2010-03-16T11:00:00.003-04:00

My older sister, Emily, sent me this email:

Hey bro,

I'm sure you'll get this from a lot of different sources, but I thought this article was really good and interesting, with some great stuff about teaching math specifically in the latter half.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/07/magazine/07Teachers-t.html?pagewanted=1&hp

It seems like kind of a cool time to be a teacher, with people realizing how important you are as an individual. If you get a chance to read it, I'd love to hear your thoughts, if it squares with your experience...

Since I've been such a delinquent blogger, I thought I would post my response, though it is long and boring, and hardly blog-worthy:

This is a great article. My experiences of teacher training have been rather scatter-shot and away from the academic mainstream, so it's fascinating to hear a lot of the concepts I've been synthesizing on my own are already parts of academic movements. The two "education" classes I took at Grinnell were really just sociology courses about education and far from teacher training. (I fear for any classroom that gets led by some of my peers in those classes.)

Now I'm in what's called an "alternative" certification program; the "alternative" implying less-than or not-preferred to the mainstream course of going to graduate schools. But this article in many ways validates the "alternative" path. Some educators do the mainstream thing of a 4-year bachelors in education plus a 2 or 3-years masters without setting foot in a real classroom. If they are at a university that even believes in teaching "methods," than maybe they've analyzed footage of a classroom. But if we have no idea of what makes a great teacher and certainly don't know how to create one, than shouldn't we put the teacher in the classroom before deciding if it's worth our time trying to teach them to teach?

That said, my alternative certification classes have been far from exemplary uses of my time except for the fact that it got me into the classroom faster than anything else I could find (plus a great amount of practice teaching in a summer school classroom.) We've spent countless hours going over how to decipher the state's No Child Left Behind mandated standards and how to be accountable to implement them in the classroom. The only two tools we've learned (over and over with classes since June) are Bloom's Taxonomy of understanding (Knowledge, Comprehension, Application, Analysis, Evaluation, Synthesis) and Marzano's High Impact Teaching Strategies (HITS - including such gems as graphic organizers, cooperative learning, taking notes, etc.)

Identifying and pinpointing what actually makes a great teacher is such a fascinating challenge. I read one great article last year (the New Yorker maybe?) that did an exhaustive meta-study on teaching and the one universal trait they found in all great teachers was "with-it-ness," whatever that means. The trait I've seen in the truly great classroom managers (though I don't always know if they're also great teachers) is an ability to be completely bipolar with students. Literally within the same sentence I've watched these teachers go from tough-love disciplinarian with crazy-eyes and the vein popping in their forehead to affectionate idol and hero of the classroom.

Something that I've been focusing on in my observations of other teachers that the article doesn't address is effective questioning. I think it might be the single most important skill across disciplines, but especially in math. I observed one great math teacher (as partly measured by test scores, as the article puts it) and wrote down every question she asked. By the end of an hour-long period, I had written down over 40 questions, and they weren't all just simple, comprehension level questions but a lot of "how did you get that?" and "why is that the answer?"

The school I work at doesn't give teachers long-term contracts, largely so that it has the flexibility to get rid of low-performers and move on. The principal at our school also has an incredible intuition of who will be great and who will need extra help. She saw me working within a complete mess of an organization and pulled me up, but tried me out in a more limited role for the first half of the year. This past month she moved me up to be the 6th grade math teacher, which all the math teachers have told me is the critical year for math student's success, though I'm still trying to figure out why.

Anyways, I've got to get my classroom ready. I have no idea yet if I'm one of the greats or one of the slick-looking failures. I've been stealing every tool and resource I can get my hands on, so I'll definitely be looking for Lemov's book when it comes out. Thank you for sending me this article. I'd love to hear your thoughts, too.

Every Night on Eleanor Avenue

2009-09-07T16:10:00.001-04:00

Doodle Series

2009-07-21T21:00:00.005-04:00

Official report of the ending of the previous week

2009-07-21T19:29:00.007-04:00

My increasingly settled and domestic immersion into the Texan Republic has made me remiss in my consistent posting to the Churchmanistani base. It is hard to prioritize gathering intelligence while building a life as a new young teacher convincing enough to allow the Texan authorities to extend my diplomatic papers. Below is my official post from the ending of the previous week.

Last weekend I:

Saw the most recent Harry Potter movie with Emily and some pals from the teaching institute. Perhaps I should read the books before passing judgment, but I'm instantly suspect of any movie that the Vatican approves of. Though, the Pope hated the Da Vinci Code, so maybe he does have some taste. We followed the movie with hot wings, which I have not found an official Catholic opinion on so you'll have to judge for yourself.

Played Frisbee Golf. While trying to find the beautiful course hidden behind a middle school, Emily and I tramped through an adjacent park. In that adjacent park populated by men riding very small bicycles like urban clowns, my besandaled foot was covered in fire ants and is currently covered in unbearably itchy welts.

Bought a new car.

Car dealerships now are set up sort of like a casino; they do everything they can to keep you there for as long as possible. The most disconcerting thing my dealer did was talk to me for about a minute and then rush off for five minutes to "answer a question." Luckily, I had my "smart phone" to entertain me. While the dealer disappeared, I would double check different ratings and prices on my car. I would use my calculator on the latest offer to make sure it made sense to me. When I still had time to kill after doing that, I played video games, rather than sit there and get impatient. The entire ordeal took around five hours, and I ended up with about the car at about the price that I wanted so I feel like I came away about as unscathed as I could expect considering my absolute lack of experience.

Played Ultimate Frisbee. This Sunday was only in the low 90s instead of the 100s, so I probably only drank half a gallon of water. Afterward, one of the players invited us to join him at his favorite restaurant. The dinner was incredible, home-made Pakistani food, which was in the family of (though definitely different from) my Indian food excursions. The evening was full of good conversation and way too much food.

High School English

2009-06-23T19:13:00.002-04:00

As part of my teaching institute, I observed a high school English class. It was a three and a half hour class, and about ninety percent of the period consisted of the students writing. This did not leave me much to observe, so I answered the given prompts along with the students to pass the time. You might note that I don’t always answer the prompt completely, which would undoubtedly hurt my grade had I turned them in, but the prompts were timed, and it seems inauthentic to revise them too heavily here. For some reason, I also chose to answer the first few prompts in second person, which I guess seemed more journalistic or something at the time.

Prompt 1: Give your basic information = name, age, where and when born, physical description.

David Churchman, twenty-three years old, was born in Arlington, VA, a close suburb of Washington, D.C. on July, 31, 1985, a warm summer Wednesday. Today, he rises an average of five feet, nine inches off of the ground and sports an unruly beard and shaggy mop-top. His feet are disproportionately short and wide, though his toes are generally handsome in length and relative size. His physique is far from similar to Brad Pitt’s, but he likes to think he would give Cary Grant a run for his money in his hey-day. The back of his hand shows evidence of being used as a notepad, though probably not today. His hands also show evidence of recently peeled or healed blisters, possibly indicating some past physical labor.

Prompt 2: What are your likes and dislikes? Be specific. Give solid, reasonable explanations for each.

David loves a breeze on a hot day. He loves the relief it provides when you’re working a little too hard. He loves the way it tussles your hair a little like a swimsuit model on a beach photo-shoot. He loves the chaos of people chasing after lost hats, dollar bills or newspapers. He even loves the little grit that it sometimes blows into your eyes so that maybe you have to turn away for a moment. More than that, he loves sitting in the shade of a gnarly old tree with a breeze blowing the speckles of sunlight poking through the branches occasionally across his face.

David remembers one time when he was twelve and he was sitting on the large branch on the tree in the front yard where the family had the swing drilled into its thick underbelly. This was several years before the family had returned from a vacation to discover that a storm had twisted this massive branch that stuck out at a perfect ninety degree angle so that men had to come to saw away hundred of pounds of firewood. David loved sitting on top of that branch with a book in his hand, ostensibly to read, but mostly he would look around at the squirrels playing below him or the neighbors walking their blissed-out dogs around the block. With its coarse bark, the tree was not very comfortable to sit in, but the idea of sitting in the tree kept him up there for hours. He must have looked serene because a man came by and asked to take a few pictures, as he was a photographer and wanted to submit a picture of him to the County Fair.

David wonders how well this man did at the County Fair; if he ended up using any of those pictures of the boy in the tree with a book. He wonders if people saw that picture and decided to sit in a tree only to discover that it is not as comfortable or serene as the boy made it look, but decided to stay in the tree for a while because they liked the idea of sitting in a tree with a book. He wonders if they also stopped to stare up into the branches, marveling at the complex shapes and faces that were constantly shifting and changing in the patterns of branches and leaves while a breeze cut through the warm air.

Prompt 3: Give 3 things that you stand for or believe in. Why? How do you show this? Give solid, reasonable explanations for each. (*Ambassador’s note: while simple for a high school student, this prompt pained me the most to even attempt. I don’t think what I came up with are necessarily the three most important things I believe in, but they will have to do for now.*)

I believe that a strong education is a fundamental human right, and it is absolutely necessary for a just society to progress that its entire population receive one. I believe in the power of compassion, forgiveness and the benefit of the doubt, and the inefficacy of conflict or competition as problem solving strategies. I believe in the power and necessity of humor, and that without it there could be no beauty or art (which I believe are also essential to the human experience.)

Prompt 4: What 3 past influences (events or people) have shaped you into the person you are today? Give specifics.

That Old Time Religion:

My family went to church at least every Sunday. Various members of our family and I at different times were ushers, acolytes, choristers, organists, hand-bell ringers, church bell ringers, lay Eucharistic ministers, lesson readers, presidents of the vestry, leaders and attendees of church school, pancake flippers on Shrove Tuesday, dish-washers at youth group spaghetti dinners, and I believe we hit every member of the Nativity in plays: Gabriel, shepherds, sheep, donkeys, angels, Joseph, Mary, and of course baby-Jesus. I think we did everything in the church at least once except for blessing the sacrament, though my maternal grandfather certainly did that a few times as a Lutheran minister, as well as baptizing me shortly before he died. I’ve been working at an Episcopalian summer camp for eight summers, ostensibly teaching campers how to live well as Christians. My ideology and morality have been hugely if not entirely shaped by my numerous encounters with the church, the Bible, and Jesus’ teachings.

Now, I tell evangelists (and get maybe a little too much pleasure in doing so) that I’m 99% Christian. That other 1% of Jesus’ teachings where it’s important to believe He is the Son of God (or that there is a God to be a Son of) and that He was resurrected from a brutal murder is just not that important to me, and I don’t especially believe it would be that important to any hypothetical deity what I believed compared with the way I live my life and treat other people and the world I live in.

Other People:

It seems too obvious and probably some form of Freudian therapy to mention my parents as an influence on “who I am today.” I will refrain from expanding the hows and whys, as my mother is my only faithful reader. Perhaps she’ll explain it on her blog. For that matter, there are innumerable friends, family, teachers, and random passerby that have profoundly influenced every aspect of my self, but to try to pinpoint every piece of my personality and ideology to various people is fairly tedious.

An Event:

I am hard pressed to think of a single event that measurably changed my fundamental character or personality, but what pops into my head is a moment I had with Joe Cavanaugh. He was a cheerful, severely mentally handicapped boy in my third-grade class who died towards the end of the school year. I don’t remember any sort of deterioration in his health, or even the conversation where I was told that he had died. I do remember going out to dinner one night, probably to Black Eyed Pea’s, and either on the way there or on the way back going to view Joe’s body.

I didn’t realize where we were going or what we were doing until I was standing in front of the dimly-lit room full of somber looking adults with a coffin sitting on the far side. I walked through the gray and black suits, acutely aware of my ratty t-shirt, shorts, and beat-up sneakers that are the uniform of any eight-year-old boy. In my memory, it seems like I walked straight up to the coffin without talking to anyone, stepped up on something, looked down on a face that looked nothing like Joe without his glasses or his open-mouthed smile, thought I should probably say a prayer or at least a good-bye, and then walked straight out again. I also can’t remember my family being there with me; as if they had dropped me off at the curb like at soccer practice.

Though a lonely memory, this isn’t the event that comes to mind as particularly shaping me. Much more vividly, I remember being one of Joe’s student helpers that pushed his wheelchair when he needed to go somewhere. I remember being alone in the cavernous hallway with Joe and another boy with me, who I think may have been Kevin Reiley. I ran down the hall with Joe, occasionally catching a ride on the back of his chair like I still do with carts at the grocery store. An ancient administrator named Mrs. Carmichael with steely talons that came up behind you during lunch and clutched your shoulder with an iron grip came behind us while we were making a sharp turn, yelled at us in dismay, and sent us back to class while she took care of Joe.

I don’t remember any punishment or lecture, but I distinctly remember the sense of guilt that I had abused my responsibility and power over someone so helpless. It may have been the first time I moved past the inherent psychopathy of childhood and felt anything akin to guilt or remorse.

A memory I group with this is a Christmas around the same time. My younger Churchmanistani sister had gotten a three foot tall stuffed, pink Power Ranger. I had some reason to be upset with my older sister so I grabbed the Power Ranger by the ankles and whacked my sis' square in the face with the dense, foam-filled vigilante. My older sister's prompt tears filled me with immediate guilt. Up until that point I had seen her as completely omnipotent over me until suddenly I was in a position of power over her, and I had completely abused it - inflicting an act of violence far more cruel than she had ever enacted in her older-sisterly teasing.

Perhaps it goes back to my Christian upbringing that my most shaping childhood memories are moments of extreme guilt...

Metaphorical Sports

2009-06-12T20:52:00.003-04:00

Oftentimes sports are used as metaphors. Metaphors of conquest, war, love, sex, freedom, oppression, poetry, prose, or whatever else the observer wishes to project onto them. Last night I went to a San Antonio Missions game, our local minor league baseball team. Baseball for whatever reason tends to inspire the most art in this American culture, especially literature, out of any sport. The best explanation for this I've heard is that there's so much time between every play that there is an opportunity to meditate on what you've just seen. Perhaps this encourages a fan base of rabidly introspective writers that appreciate slowly processing images of perfect pitches.

Based on what I saw at the Missions game, this theory seems doubtful. The typical minor league baseball fan has two beers in his hand, is poorly shaven, and is decidedly overweight. Maybe I am exposing my biases here, but it does not seem that any of these qualities lend towards particularly good writing (it certainly doesn't on this blog.)

Today at TOIWF we had an end of year Olympics amongst our teams. The culminating event was a 6 on 6 basketball game. Half the other side's team were men well over 6 feet, and their one woman is my crazy Ukrainian friend Solomiya who lives and breathes all things basketball. I, on the other hand, am 5'9" and played basketball for one season when I was seven years of age, and decided that it was probably not the best sport for me. Being a consummate nerd, I had just read Malcolm Gladwell's excellent article about how 'David' (that's me!) basketball teams (which he uses for a metaphor for underdogs in general) beat 'Goliath' teams. Not to spoil the article's ending, but the general gist is that underdogs win by working much, much harder; putting on the full-court press, if you will. So that's what I did. I put a hard 'd' on whoever had the ball, putting especial intensity as they lackadaisically tried to walk the ball to their side.

The result was that I forced a lot of turnovers, and got their team frustrated and angry. Angry to the point that the impulsive gentleman who took pranks too far during Camp TOIWF full body-checked me whenever I got near him. (He probably has 50 to 100 pounds on me.) In the end, my ridiculous effort (which prompted many laughs and cheers from the sidelines) ended up winning the game. There's a metaphor in that game somewhere, but this rant-y post has already overstayed its welcome, so I won't draw it out for you.

October 9, 2006

2009-06-06T16:33:00.004-04:00

North Korea's recent missile tests have had me thinking a lot about the song cycle I composed at Grinnell as my senior project. I've been wanting to put it on the blog for a while, but it's deceptively difficult to put audio on this thing, so I've turned it into a video where you follow along with the score. The the text comes from Truman's speech announcing the bombing of Hiroshima, Exodus, King James Version, and the North Korean speech announcing the explosion of a nuclear bomb. Michael Oxley, my voice teacher at the time, sang, and Timothy Linn, a piano player with four hands played piano. They did a fantastic job with a very limited amount of rehearsal time, so please be kind to them.

Youtube made me split the piece into two videos, so the first 3 movements are in the first, and the last 2 are in the second. If you're going to watch just one, the second is probably flashier and more impressive, though for some reason the video quality is much worse.

I. I will sing unto the LORD for he hath triumphed gloriously. The horse and the rider hath he thrown into the sea.
Sixteen hours ago, an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese army base.

II. That bomb has more power than twenty thousand tons of TNT. It is an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic power of the universe. The force from which the sun draws its power has been loosed against those who brought war to the Far East.

III. The LORD is my strength and my song. And he has become my salvation.
The field of scientific research in the DPRK successfully conducted an underground nuclear test under secure conditions on October 9, 2006 at a stirring time when all the people are making a great leap forward in the building of powerful socialist nation.

IV. It has been confirmed that there was no such danger as radioactive emission in the course of the nuclear test as it was carried out under scientific consideration and careful calculation. The nuclear test was conducted with indigenous technology one hundred percent. It marks a historic event as it greatly encouraged and pleased the KPA and people that have wished to have powerful self-reliant defense capability.

V. It will contribute to to defending the peace and stability on the Korean peninsula and in the are around it.
The LORD is a man of war. The LORD is his name.

What drew me to these three texts was their shared tone of grandiosity, confidense, and complete trust in these war-machines that they are celebrating. There is something a little off about the humanity or empathy of the writers, and that alienness makes it read like strange poetry to me.

Belated April Fool's

2009-06-04T22:05:00.003-04:00

Besides creating an important document for my diplomatic excursions, this blog has provided me with an outlet for my creativity while I've been on hiatus from serious music-making. One of my creative highlights of the hear was my April Fool's day prank on my manager. Here is a link to an excellent post about it by my friend Stephanie with great pictures. The finished product is the top picture, and if you look closely you can see my manager's computer poking out above her completely submersed desk. I believe more than 250 balloons were successfully inflated, if I remember correctly.

Happy 100

2009-06-03T15:55:00.003-04:00

This is my 100th post, which seems appropriate for what I was thinking about writing. I've been trying to figure out why it has been so difficult for me to post this year. While on my international diplomatic mission, it was so simple to pick snapshots of my amazing experience. I tried never to write about anything that I would not want to read about myself on someone else's blog, and I'm fairly fickle, so only the most colorful highlights and anectdotes made it.

This year I've been in a more entrenched assignment with TOIWF, and it is hard for me to keep seeing my mundane day-to-day experiences as a bemused foreign ambassador when I'm so caught up in the midst of it. I've had posts in my head, but I never got excited enough about them to sit down and write them out. There was going to be a lengthy discourse about the generally loveable and frequently annoying animal menagerie that has sprung up outside of my apartment because of the overly benevolent nature of my landlord and the vast pool of strays in San Antonio. I had an essay brewing about the most important cultural eucharist in San Antonio, capable of bringing all sorts of groups together, healing many wounds, and readily available in any neighborhood: the breakfast taco. I was going to write about the big brotheresque intensity of taking a middle school math test that lets me say that I am "highly qualified" to be a teacher according to No Child Left Behind.

But I could never bring myself to post anything but inane doodles that kept me entertained during one of many interminable Friday "trainings" with TOIWF. When so little that I do every day at TOIWF makes me proud or reminds me of my increasingly distant adventures abroad, it is hard for me to write something that I would want to read. I wish I had the ability of Hemingway or Steinbeck to make mundane daily scenes into beautiful poetry, unfortunately my mundane scenes are just mundane. Perhaps my life lacks the tragedy that it needs to have the gravitas of those alchoholics' stories, but while it also lacks the successes or adventures that I enjoy writing about, I will continue to struggle to make consistent posts.

But in this hundredth post, I issue hope to my loyal fans. In two short weeks I begin a profression notorious for adventure and fulfilment which I hope will cause cornacopias of posts to spring forth: teaching. I will be teaching 7th grade math, critical thinking, and chorus at the school I've worked at with TOIWF this year. I am ecstatic about this job, and have been getting a very warm welcome from the teachers I have gotten to know this year. I am also terrified, and rightfully so. What makes me think that I can possibly influence a group of students so statistically disadvantaged that some very smart people think their achievement gap is biologically innate? (Jame Watson, co-discoverer of DNA's structure is among those crackpots.) Perhaps in the next 100 posts, we'll find out.

Doodle Series: 6

2009-05-29T19:00:00.002-04:00

This doodle is fairly intricate, so it may require clicking.

Doodle Series: 6

2009-05-29T18:55:00.001-04:00

Doodle Series: 5

2009-05-15T18:45:00.000-04:00

Camp TOIWF

2009-03-14T17:29:00.003-04:00

My work with TOIWF led me to co-direct a five day overnight camp in the Texas hill country for 120 inner-city middle schoolers last week with Allison, another soul that has spent a lifetime of summers at camps. Directing a camp from scratch is quite a bit more difficult than my exploits in the Appalachian wilderness. During the week I performed every conceivable task to keep the camp operating as smoothly as possible. I was chiefly responsible for overseeing programming, but that did not preclude me from serving lunch, scrubbing toilets, playing nurse, telling bed-time stories, managing counselors, managing my managers, and of course managing children.

I have very few talents that I did not get to employ at my camp and in the grand summing up of these things the camp was successful. The first day and a half of weather was sublime, but from there the temperature dropped thirty degrees and we faced torrential rain after months of drought. Had this camp been in a state with normal weather during March, it would be reasonable to expect campers to come with jackets and sweaters, but many San Antonio children do not even own winter coats. Many spent the last few days huddled in their Pokemon printed blankets, looking like lost refugees from a florescent sci-fi city.

It was difficult to keep morale up, but we did have a number of heated buildings to work with, and we came up with a variety of last minute programming that kept kids out of the elements as much as possible. Larger than life board-game night was a success, with kids jumping each other as checkers, and hoola-hooping dodgeballs as hungry-hungry hippos.

Two moments did drift a little too close to catastrophe for my liking, but they eventually worked out. Immediately after finishing our night-time programming and the beginning of the inevitable chaos of breaking into cabin groups, the lightning storm caused a complete blackout. A few emergency lights in the kitchen and infirmary were all that lit our huge camp site. Girls screamed at ever new thunderbolt, and many wouldn't stop screaming for a minute. Counselors counterproductively yelled over the screamers to stop screaming, until finally calmer voices prevailed. During a lull in the rain, we managed to get children back to their cabins for the night lit by cellphones and very few flashlights. I trudged around in the mud and the rain for an hour making sure every cabin was safe and ready to go to sleep, distributing night-time medicines that were almost forgotten, and finally telling a story to youngest cabin of girls in my most soothing and monotone voice. I drew it out as long as my voice held out, and ended it with a pun.

The other near-catastrophe was during the last hour of camp. The weather had pushed everyone to their physical limit, and tempers were high as I tried to end camp on a positive note. After finishing a well-received slide-show and dance performance, a cabin of boys got up and showed off all the cabin signs they had stolen and vandalized during the week and taunted the entire camp. All pranks were supposed to be approved, and I had told the counselor of this cabin explicitly that they were not allowed to do this because previous pranks had already gotten too heated. The camp got to its feet and came the closest I've ever seen to an out-and-out brawl. Allison and I immediately intervened and dispersed it quickly, but there was a moment that I was afraid my campers would go home to their parents bruised and bloody because of the adolescent mind of a 23 year old.

Still, children are resilient, and I jumped straight from the brawl into our popular announcements song, which distracted them long enough for the cruel, unfunny prank to sink back into its properly low place in their haze of their memories of camp:

In North Leakey Texas is where we play
Outside is where we spend most of our days
Chillin' out, maxin', relaxin' all cool
Shooting some Bball cuz we ain't in school.
But we're late, we realize, and that ain't no good
Because we don't want to miss any of that CCY food
So shut your mouth tight when your hand's in the air
It's announcement time at Camp City Year.

Remembrances of Teachers Past

2009-03-05T08:57:00.006-05:00

It is hard to say where exactly the embassy will ever send an ambassador, but it seems more and more clear to me my next major diplomatic mission will be in a classroom. My time working with TOIWF has given me some powerful allies on the San Antonio education scene, which hopefully will open doors for me to infiltrate a school completely, posing as a teacher.

As I prepare for this mission and begin to see myself more and more as a teacher, I begin to think about the teachers that I have had that truly made an impact. Kindergarten is a blur for me. I remember once sitting at a table, doing simple math problems and being praised for it, I remember creating butterfly crowns and standing with my classmates for our graduation, and little else. First grade, I remember being in a classroom integrated with both first and second graders. I remember the frustration of not being able to read yet and memorizing the big books as the teachers read along, so that if called on, I would have an answer. I remember my second grade teacher's cumbersome name, Mrs. Ishizaki, rumors of her taking smoke breaks, and suddenly being able to read. I was placed in the advanced reading group, which involved playing ancient computer games in the library. I only have two true memories from third grade: forging my father's signature on a note telling my parents I had not completed my large Virginia project, and waiting for my father in the principal's office after my epic spork fight with Bobby Pratt. Fifth grade is also a blur of anecdotes, like the ancient Mrs. Nyce who spelled it with a "y" so she didn't have to be, and the faded film strip highlighting the upcoming building of the Suez Canal.

Fourth grade, however, I remember vividly. I used to chalk up Mr. Bigsby's impact on me as his being a strong, young male role model at a time when I needed one, but that was only a small piece. I remember his scrupulously organized classroom, and the way he had us organize all of our work into a binder with a table of contents. I think that was the most organized I have ever been at school. He asked me the next year if I still had an assignment that he wanted to use, and I managed to find it and give it to him, which I would be hard pressed to do now, even with my largely digigtized life. I remember the "writer's workshop," where we wrote poems and short stories, and then edited and reviewed for our peers. I remember the praise and the extra math assignments he gave me that I actually wanted to complete, so utter was my devotion to him. During recess, he could throw the football something like 150 yards, even though his entire right calf was missing due to a recent surgery.

I remember so little of third and fifth grade, but I still remember how Mr. Bigsby organized his classroom.

Doodle Series: 4

2009-01-12T00:22:00.000-05:00

Doodle Series: 3

2009-01-11T00:21:00.000-05:00

Doodle Series: 2

2009-01-10T00:20:00.000-05:00

Doodle

2009-01-09T00:01:00.003-05:00

I haven't really felt like writing for a while, but I have been doodling a lot lately, so I thought I'd post those for the next few, so I encourage you to enlarge them and hope you enjoy:

Non-Profit for Profit

2008-11-20T14:20:00.002-05:00

Last week, I drove down with a few people from TOIWF to Mission, Texas to work with the for-profit division of our non-profit. That we have a for-profit division seems a little shady to me, but apparently the tax-man hasn’t caught wind, yet. What they do is hold large-scale service projects for corporate employees. Basically, they’re service field trips, and in exchange for making a bunch of employees feel like they’re making a difference and working for a company that “cares,” not to mention a few spots on the local news channels with their company’s name all over them, our for-profit gets a healthy budget to do a big ole service project with, and everyone wins.

With that healthy budget, we spent a few days prepping the service site, in this case a Boys and Girls Club. This involved taping and tarping all the rooms we were going to paint, priming what needed to be primed, cutting wood for anything we planned to build, organizing tools and workspaces, putting together canvases for panel murals, and all sorts of other miscellaneous schlepping. Like I wrote in my , a lot of last postthis work was fairly monotonous, but in a way that let my mind wander pleasantly or chat with whoever was working near me.

The people working with me were probably the most refreshing part of the whole experience. A large part of why I joined TOIWF was to have an opportunity to work with similarly minded and motivated peers, but that didn't turn out to really be the case. But because they work closely with corporate sponsors on a tight time frame, our for-profit only uses the best and brightest from TOIWF. This meant that on top of the unique feeling of not feeling like I'm working harder than everyone else, I had some of the most interesting conversations I’ve had so far this year. One night hanging out in the hotel room, I found myself, raised Episcopalian in Virginia, discussing the Old Testament with an Arkansan raised Evangelical and a Michigander raised Jewish.

The week reminded me a lot of the “tech week” of a play. Anticipation built over our three days of prep as we figured out exactly how to manage 150 people through a day of effective service. The last day we had everything completed that we needed, and we started shuffling our feet a little bit until a last minute shipment from Home Depot meant we needed to figure out how to put together 5 wheelbarrows. It wouldn’t be a play unless something went wrong at the last minute, and those wheelbarrows were the wobbliest, most off-balanced ever bolted together in a hurry.

On the actual day, I was in charge of a few projects outside, the most fun of which was applying sledge hammers and hacksaws to a bunch of death-trap, rusty bleachers. I somehow lucked into the biggest, burliest group of volunteers. They looked like a football team, and they all towered over me while I walked them through safety and the components of the projects. Luckily, they were also incredibly self-motivated and hard working, almost to a fault. After checking on a different part of the project, I returned to find someone’s Uncle Arturo with a power saw dismantling the bleachers. I was given strict instructions not to let any of the corporate volunteers operate power tools, so I had a mini aneurysm while I tried to figure out who this Uncle Arturo was, but since the tool was making such quick work of the bleachers and he wasn’t technically a volunteer, I let it go.

After my week of Uncle Arturo, interfaith dialogue, and monotonous task reverie, I came out remarkably refreshed. To be honest, over the past few weeks I was sinking into a mild depression. I was sleeping more and more but only getting more tired and emotional during the day. Right as I was feeling most exhausted, one of my teammates quit, which made me more unstable than I’ve ever felt, and it took a few weeks and this trip to actually recover. Now, I’ve resolved to work fewer hours and take it less seriously, and to find more time for myself outside of work to do the things that make me happy. I’ve started writing music again, and I finally found some guys to play Frisbee with on a regular basis, and started doing that this week, which has been great, though I’m rustier than I would like.

Play Time

2008-11-10T21:34:00.003-05:00

I remember when I used to sit on the floor and play for hours on end. It could be Superman and He-Man vs. the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, or Lego's, or a handful of small airplanes. Or something without a Trademark like a handful of change. Often it would involve long, convoluted dramas and adventures or stories. Not the most creative child, I would usually perform meticulous variations on the same narrative, over and over, looking for the perfect combination. I wish I had recorded some of those, because maybe now, with all that I know, I could find it.

Many times, my play would be interrupted by long jags of thought or unrelated fantasies and daydreams. I might continue to manipulate my small Batman, but I would be thinking about how sweet it would be to run faster than Steve at the 50 yard dash in P.E. Steve was the fastest kid in class and everyone knew it. But it would be better to be fast as the Flash on TV. Then I could run from one side of the world to the other side and have two-conversations at once because to the people I was talking to it would seem like I was standing still. I could take over the slow-motion world, reading every book, learning every language, and maybe inventing something. Like a disc that you can stand on and fly super-fast from one place to another instead of walking to school. Plus it would be really fun. Everyone would want one, so I would be super-rich.

This week I'm in Mission, TX prepping for a big service project on Thursday. As I sat stapling canvas onto panels for a mural for two hours, mostly by myself, I began to remember and think about those times of studious play. I've enjoyed the physical service projects through my work at TOIWF because I get these quiet times to think, imagine and fantasize again. Though my Hot Wheels may have been replaced by paint brushes, these periods of timelessness still refresh and intrigue me. Until I get bored and want to go watch TV.

President Elect

2008-11-05T14:00:00.003-05:00

I think it is hard not to be excited and proud at a time like this. I think many people will remember where they were when you heard that the junior senator from Illinois became President Elect Obama. I heard it first from John Stewart's lips, and then quickly switched to CNN to make sure it was for real. To try to capture the sense of communal joy, I present some excerpts from some of the texts and emails I received or sent after the victory was made final:

"I feel like I can hope again!"

"YES WE CAN! YES WE DID!"

"[expletive removed by the ambassador] yeah!!"

"...people are literally dancing in the streets."

"I'm standing on the steps of the capitol of the confedaracy."

"YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYY!!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

"Yes we can! What a thrilling victory."

"I'm crying I'm so proud of our country right now."

"We openned the champagna. Yippee"

The Churchmanistani Taxonomy of Lazy Humor

2008-10-22T19:40:00.004-04:00

For today's post, I warn you I'm getting onto my high chair to philosophize for a spell. I've been noticing a pervasive problem working with children and my peers, and I'm thinking of ways to address it specifically at my workplace, so I'd like to put my thoughts down in writing before I give out any spiels. Bare with me:

In my observations, there are four major types of humor which are overused, and at their core are not even humorous. They generate what I call "Don't-Look-Back" jokes, because if you stop to think about it, there wasn't anything particularly funny about the joke. They are the kind of moment that many people might laugh about, but when they try to retell it or explain it later, it falls completely flat. They are used because they generate easy laughs out of discomfort, and everybody likes to make people laugh to gain friends and popularity. However, at their heart they are just lazy and shallow jokes, which, if overused, will grant you a life of lazy and shallow relationships.

Now, I will go through these four types of humor, but I'll let you in on a secret. This essay is only really about the fourth kind of lazy humor, which I am often accused of using, but will contend that I rarely do, which is probably why I feel compelled to clear this up.

The first major type of lazy humor is scatological and sexual. Probably the first kind of joke we learn how to make, but people still fall back on conversations of bowel movements and vomiting well into adulthood. I grouped sexual into scatological because they are basically the same jokes, but about different functions. You may not think you overuse these types of humor, but chances are you've heard a "that's what she said" joke in the past week.

The second major type of lazy humor is violent or play fighting. When we can't think of what to talk about, we resort to sports, and talk about how our local team will grind up that away team into little pieces. And how often have you made the crack, "I know where you live."

The third major type of lazy humor is stereotyping. "You're dancing so white!" "This song is totally ganstah." "What kind of guy watches figure skating?" We have all heard the lectures about the dangers of stereotyping, but there's nothing like the drug of an easy laugh. Watch 95% of comedians, and this is entirely what they rely on.

These first three types of humor are all based around pushing people outside of their comfort level; trying to create shock value. With good timing and execution, they can frequently produce laughs. But what's actually funny about threatening to come over to someone's house and murdering them in their sleep? Now, we all generally know not to use these first three types of humor in polite or professional situations. For some reason the last type of humor is more ambiguous for us, and as a result it might be the most pervasive.

Sarcasm. Random House sarcasm this way:

sarcasm - noun
1. a harsh or bitter derision or irony.
2. a sharply ironical taunt; sneering or cutting remark: a review full of sarcasms.

I am frequently ironic, but I strive to never be sarcastic. Because irony is so frequently confused with sarcasm, let's look at that definition as well.

irony - noun

1. the use of words to convey a meaning that is the opposite of its literal meaning: the irony of her reply, “How nice!” when I said I had to work all weekend.

Literature.

a.	a technique of indicating, as through character or plot development, an intention or attitude opposite to that which is actually or ostensibly stated.

b.	(esp. in contemporary writing) a manner of organizing a work so as to give full expression to contradictory or complementary impulses, attitudes, etc., esp. as a means of indicating detachment from a subject, theme, or emotion.

3.	an outcome of events contrary to what was, or might have been, expected.

4.	the incongruity of this.

5.	an objectively sardonic style of speech or writing.

6.	an objectively or humorously sardonic utterance, disposition, quality, etc.

Now irony can frequently be employed in a sarcastic way, but it doesn't always have to be. The difference is that sarcasm always has a target; a butt of the joke. As far as I can tell, sarcasm is simply a way of masking insults as jokes. And what's funny about an insult? It's the worst kind of lazy, Don't-Look-Back humor because it is not only unfunny, but occasionally hurtful. For this reason, it is the most unprofessional and impolite, but still we use it anyways. Really, we have no idea what kind of day someone's having. We have no idea which day teasing someone about their hair, clothing, accent, blemish, project, gait, music, etc. will actually hurt them. I have plenty of days where I, "just can't take a joke." Everyone does.

So what can we joke about? Should we be constantly sober and reflective? No, there are a huge variety of types of humor that are substantial and make working fun, your relationships deeper, your mood uplifted, and your figure slimmer. Beside (non-sarcastic) irony, here are some of my favorites:

Farce/silliness
Parody/caricature
Pun
Observation
Exaggeration
Surprise/twist
Story/joke
Wit
Banter (non-sarcastic)
Play on words
Overly literal/stating the obvious
Lost in translation
Simile/juxtaposition

Things that give me hope for the world

2008-10-19T19:29:00.003-04:00

Colin Powell, double digit leads, Tina Fey, January 20th, beautiful accordion players.

The Night David Churchman Went Crazy

2008-10-12T14:15:00.003-04:00

For proper context, if understated for concision's sake, you should read this first.

The Explorer's tribe, having tolled the bell two more times than justified by any rules of decorum or comedy, had spurred me to get out of my cozy sleeping bag and stumble out of the tent I was gladly sharing with Mary and Sarah. At this point, it was past 12:30, and being in the middle of the woods, light was in short supply. I halfheartedly looked for my flashlight and shoes, but had more pressing matters at hand, so I left without footwear or luminescence.

I planned to circle around the rogue Explorers, but by the time I reached the point where I knew they must have parked their car, they had already departed. At this point, shoeless and already committed to action, I began the half hour trek back to the cabin circles of my dear MAD and the villainous Explorer's tribes.

As my bare feet gingerly made a their way back, a number of stratagems presented themselves to me. The first was to burn down the Explorer's camp, but this was immediately ruled out even in my sleepless and angry state. Next, I realized before I retaliated, I must be sure that I knew for certain that it was in fact the Explorers who had joined us in the woods. All doubt was erased from my mind when I thought back to the voices hooting in the woods, who were identified by Sarah, Mary, and myself all as two prominent Explorer's elders, Jesse and Angel. Finally, having eliminated murder and doubt from my mind, I devised a retaliation which I thought both harmless and hilarious, and I knew they would never suspect a same-night rebuke, especially on this scale.

As I walked the dark country road back to camp with startled deers jumping out of the way of my silent gate, this is the vision I had for the climatic prank of the summer, from the perspective of an Explorer tribal child:

Hark, what is this I spy?
David Churchman, is here tonight!
And does he to our sleeping camp songs of spite or malice bring?
No, not he, but of that summer treat, s'mores does he sing.

A song of equality and joy, lit by cheerful fire: "Free s'mores!
"One and all, boys and girls, come out of your darkened doors!
"Join MAD David and pay no heed to the late hour
"Or the cries of your chiding Counselor,
"Because there is no time for those that Explore
"When it is not a right and good to eat a s'more!"

And, knowing this to be true, we from our cabins rushed
Joining David in a night of song and sweet,
Until eventually, by our counselors hushed,
We returned to bed, only then noticing his bare feet.

I knew that the Explorer's tribal elders would have difficulty putting their children to sleep after an exciting evening of free s'mores. But I also knew that the children's rightful parents came to pick them that very next morning, and it mattered little if they slept well or not. As I returned to the MAD cabins, my plan felt well formulated and the consequences properly thought out. I grabbed an extra pair of sandals and a lighter from my cabin and made my way down the back path to the Explorer's camp.

I arrived in their camp with an armul of marshmallows, graham crackers and chocolate. The one practicality of my plan I was most worried about was starting a suitably large fire without waking anyone before I was ready. To my delight, the Explorers hadn't put out their fire completely, and with a few new logs and some gentle blowing, I had a suitably large bonfire (though still substantially smaller than a normal Explorers bonfire.) With fire blazing and s'more materials ready, I rang their bell heartily and yelled my siren song: "Free s'mores! Free s'mores! Everyone get your free s'mores!" and so on. Then I sat in a chair by the fire, waiting for the tribal children to rush out in delight to greet me and join me in the most ancient of camp traditions of burning gelatinous spun-sugar cyllinders and letting them melt between cheap chocolate and cardboard sweet-crackers.

Now, all did not go according to plan. Though I heard rustling in our plastic cots, no child showed the courage to come out for free s'mores. Nor did any counselor. At this point, I had built the fire too high to safely leave, so I waited a few minutes more. Eventually, Jesse, the same tribal elder I knew I had heard earlier in the woods, came out, looking sleepy and indignant, and said, "David?" in a most perplexed voice. I replied, "Enjoy the s'mores," and with that left.

I trecked back to my camp, now shoed, and though the prank was not as fun as it could have been with cheerful, chocolate covered children, I thought it was still reasonably funny. When I returned, to the woods, I saw flashlights bouncing around in the woods in the spot where I knew the Explorers had rung the bell two times too many an hour earlier. I though, "Ah, now I can go back to my original plan of scaring them in the woods!"

Until I heard a sad desperate voice calling my name at regular intervals. The flashlights belonged to Mary and Sarah, who, noticing that I was gone for an hour, decided I must be bleeding and unconcious somewhere in the woods. Mary had established base camp with Erica, who was anxiously sitting by her walky-talky, thinking of ways to explain to the tribal children that David was dead.

I apologized profusely for making them think I was dead, and we all went to sleep. The next morning, we woke our oblivious tribal children and brought them back to Shrine Mont proper, to eat at the great dining hall. There, it came to my attention that it was not in fact the Explorers who had rung the bell two times to many, but it was the St. George's camp. Though still not especially funny or clever, I did respect the prank more than before, and that I retaliated against the Explorers for the wrong reason, it ushered my night into infamy.

It was, by high dicate of the Chief Shrine Mont Elder, the end of all pranks for that summer, and by high dictate of all who know and talk of Shrine Mont, "The Night David Churchman Went Crazy."

Texas' Finest

2008-10-11T14:47:00.001-04:00

Chronicles of Chihuahualand

2008-10-08T20:02:00.003-04:00

When first visiting the neighborhood of the school I'm working in with my team at TOIWF for "asset mapping," we stopped in Yolanda's Cafe for lunch. We considered leaving because it was fairly warm in the seating section, but the owner came over and turned the AC on in our section. We were the only five people in the restaurant, but after turning on our AC, the owner disappeared for five or ten minutes. Then she came out and gave us menus and disappeared again. When she came back to take our orders, she told us not order anything with cheese in it because the guy who delivers cheese hadn't come by yet.

Being a Mexican restaurant, all the dishes had cheese in them, but I chose gorditas, whose success seemed less contingent on having cheese or not. Nephiteri, my teammate decided that she didn't want anything without cheese, so she went down the block and got carry out from a different Mexican place and rejoined us right as our food arrived.

When Nephiteri opened her carry out box, the owner came over and poked around in it to see what her competition had, and disparaged it heartily for its portion size. She asked which place Nephiteri went, and when she found out, she said, "Oh, you went to the whorehouse." Nephiteri admitted that the waitresses were dressed fairly scantily, and that it was a mostly male clientele, but didn't think it was an actual whorehouse, to which the owner said, "Well, I guess they didn't show you the back room."

I haven't been back to Yolanda's, but I have stopped in Garcia's (not the alleged whorehouse) a handful of times. The third day in a row where I packed a lunch but decided to go to Garcia's instead, the waitress knew my order, and squinted at my nametag, which I wear as part of my uniform for TOIWF. After starting to eat, a woman from the kitchen came out and bent over me and also squinted at my nametag for a good long time. She said, "Oh... Churchman! She said that you were named 'Chihuahua!'" After which, she turned around and went back to the kitchen without further comment.

Toyota Making a Difference

2008-09-23T19:33:00.005-04:00

Part of what TOIWF does is organize service projects for corporations. It's mutually beneficial because their employees get an opportunity to perform enriching service, and TOIWF gets 10 or 20 thousand bucks. Much to my surprise, when I left my house at the wee hours this morning I saw a couple busloads of volunteers from Toyota performing service on my very own graveyard, giving the wrought iron fence a fresh coat of black paint. Out of professional interest in how they were organized, I took my time going by, and everyone seemed to be working on their own patch and having a good time bettering the community they sell cars to.

On my way home today I admired the shiny new coat of paint on my graveyard, and it really did make a difference. However, when I got to the wrought iron gate not around the cemetery but in front of my own house, I was a bit miffed. My gate had also received a shiny new coat, but only half of it. Well, really only a quarter of it because it was just the outside half of one half of the gate. Apparently, the Toyota volunteers saw my rusted old gate, took it upon themselves to improve, but then got distracted by something shiny.

I will resist the temptation to broaden this story into a metaphor for volunteer service in general, but I did think of a reason other than ineptitude or ambivalence. A more Machiavellian reason may be that they painted a quarter of our fence to shame us into taking better care of it. That way they conserve their resources, but the end result of a more beautiful neighborhood is still eventually the same. In a way, this also works as a metaphor for all the physical service TOIWF does. We clean up a park to shame a neighborhood into doing more to keep gangs out of it. Before I saw that as a positive ripple of our service, but on the receiving end, I feel a little patronized today. Thanks for your powerful service, Toyota. Now do the rest of my fence.

Life Map

2008-09-14T20:28:00.004-04:00

I apologize I haven't had much time or energy for a "real" post, but I'll keep throwing up the random stuff I do at TOIWF. Below is a "life map" they asked me to do, where they asked me to create a visual representation of my life in about fifteen minutes. I think the result is entertaining, if not entirely comprehensive or accurate. I recommend clicking on it for the big version.

Media

2008-09-07T19:33:00.003-04:00

I am extremely reluctant to share the following videos, featuring myself, but the general consensus is that they are funny, and I've never managed to include a video on my blog, so I thought I'd try it for novelty's sake. Also, you may have noticed that I've played with the format, so let met know if my giant marble likeness is too distracting, or anything else.

Get it straight: the views of this blog do not represent City Year, inc. or any of the other organizations mentioned, etc., etc., etc.

TOIWF

2008-09-07T19:28:00.004-04:00

This year in San Antonio, I'm working full time for a national non-profit called City Year dedicated dedicated to service and especially education. Every time I mention it, I'm supposed to say "THE CONTENTS OF THIS WEB SITE DO NOT REFLECT IN ANY WAY THE POSITIONS OF CITY YEAR OR AMERICORPS. FOR OFFICIAL CITY YEAR POLICY SEE HTTP://WWW.CITYYEAR.ORG." That sounds rather bland and won't jive with the flow of my blog, so instead, I'll just call it "The Organization I Work For" from now on, or TOIWF for short.

Residency

2008-08-30T14:29:00.006-04:00

Last month, this ambassador's aimless wanderings and too-brief excursion in the Shenandoah came to an end. I have set up a semi-permanent outpost of Churchmanistan in the strange land of San Antonio, and I must say that I am still learning the intricacies of diplomacy required of a resident rather than a vagabond visitor. I must say the first piece of culture shock came when I saw this sign in the window of most restaurants and shopping establishments:

My excursions have generally brought me to places where it goes without saying that it is rude to bring firearms into a dining establishment. I guess I am glad that most places I have seen sport this sign, but I wonder about the ones that don't. My French landlord, Fabien, says that he doesn't mind the loose gun laws here, because even though he would never touch a gun or let one come into his house, he knows that his neighbors have a healthier than usual sense of property because they are fairly certain that if they trespass, they will indeed be shot. I was growing used to the 51% sign (51% of what?) when I was truly reminded of what a strange land I was in by this one:

Which, for those with trouble reading it, I will paraphrase: "Texans! Remember that slavery is actually illegal in Texas!" One-hundred and fifty years later, and they still need reminding.

My house is couched between six beautiful, poorly tended cemeteries, replete with Confederate soldiers. I find the number of plaques, statues, buildings, businesses and monuments dedicated to the confederacy and confederate soldiers to be interesting. For example, let us remember the Alamo, San Antonio's most famous landmark. It is a fort in which confederate veterans proudly stood against the invading Mexicans. I find these monuments ironic because San Antonio's population is now 61% Hispanic.

I also think it is ironic that I have settled next to a cemetery. Many times during my trip through Europe, I called it my "Graveyard Tour" because of the impossibility of walking two blocks without tripping over some historical spot where thousands of people died. I must have enjoyed myself, because now I live next to the oldest cemetery in San Antonio, and after it rains for a few days, my cemetery is covered with wildflowers.

Magott's

2008-08-30T14:22:00.003-04:00

I post this because I thought it was special that a someone named "Magott" not only decided to use their name for their grocery store, but also put "fresh meat" immediately underneath their name. Something makes me think it's not so fresh. I was also amused by this (be sure to read the bottom arrow):

For whom I tolled the bell

2008-08-30T13:00:00.002-04:00

At MAD Camp I had the job of keeping the schedule, which I often did by ringing a very large bell. At seven every morning I rang it especially long and loud to make sure the MAD tribe's children woke up. I would say that I generally rang it for two to three minutes, and because I am generally furious to be awake at that hour, I found it especially cathartic to ring it as hard as I could. About a month and a half into the summer, it came to my attention that I was also waking up the nearby Explorers' tribal children, because they preferred to wake up at 7:15.

The next morning, trying to be especially considerate of the Explorers tribe, I reduce my ringing to less than thirty seconds, a 75% reduction in my ringing, which in my estimation was a more than fair concession. The Explorers, primitive as they are in their communication, expressed that this was indeed not enough the next morning by covering my bell's knocker with a goopy mixture that I believe they would call "papier mache" but I would call "ooze." Needless to say, my generally furious attitude (see above) was exacerbated by having a hand covered in ooze, so I rang the bell with especial vigor.

The Explorers, non-verbal communicators that they are, stole my bell that same day, replacing it with an insult of a thing, hardly large enough to call a family to dinner.. I careened about the mountain, trying to find the bell, for it is a large and heavy thing. I successfully found it later that night in the Explorers chief's trunk. I hoisted it over my head, and rang it plentifully to the adulation of the MAD tribal children. The Explorers conspired with a previously neutral ally to have it stolen again, but through my excellent interpersonal skills, I managed to locate and retrieve it again. At this point, the most feared and powerful tribal chief declared the bell unstealable because a very rich and old matron had made alms to Shrine Mont with the bell, so it was a sacred thing.

At this point, I, reasonable and slow to hold a grudge, began ringing the bell just a few times each morning, and I believed all hostilities between myself and the Explorers tribe had ended. Safe in that knowledge, we took our children to spend a night in Shrine Mont's wildnerness. The MAD tribal children are not known for their heartiness or love of the outdoors, so I was feeling especially protective of them. An hour after successfully navigating their fear of spiders to get them to sleep, I heard the familiar toll of my faithful bell, which had been clearly relocated to the woods nearby. I decided, well Explorers, that is good prankstleben, and I hold no grudge. But, when they rang the bell two more times over the course of half an hour, all the while shouting incoherently in a voice I was sure was the twang of an Explorers tribe elder, I decided that I did indeed hold a grudge and it was time to act apon it.

Hence began the night which is now known in Shrine Mont lore as "The Night David Churchman went Crazy." To be continued.

(Photos courtesy of Sarah McGrath)

Report to the Head of State of Churchmanistan from the Temporary Ambassador to Italy.

2008-08-25T22:29:00.006-04:00

The title comes from Emily S, who also says: "These were the fun lions that I saw, or statues of things killing things."

Language Barriers

2008-08-19T21:54:00.011-04:00

Back in the good old days when I was traveling throughout the old country, I actually had quite a good time whenever there was a really serious language-barrier. It was sort of a game I would play to see how much I could get done and communicate without actually having any idea what the other person was saying. When things got really desperate and it started looking like I wouldn't have a place to stay or something like that, I would have to laugh because of how ludicrous and desperate I must have looked pantomiming ridiculous gestures.

Working at Shrine Mont, I wanted to somehow incorporate that zany fun that I had into an activity, and the following is what I came up with: (photos courtesy again of Sara McGrath, or maybe Rosanna Hawkins)

Team Yellow:

Your country speaks English fluently, so you are already one step ahead of everyone else because you can understand each other, and everyone can understand you. Unfortunately, all but one person in your country is blind. The one sighted person on your team is the supreme dictator, in charge of making all the important decisions, and everyone must abide by his or her orders. You must choose this dictator before the activity begins, and they must remain in charge throughout.

The people of your country are very grateful for having such a benevolent and wise dictator, and take great offense to anything they perceive as an insult to him or her. Every time you make a trade or any kind of successful interaction, you must take time to give thanks to your leader by performing the head-shoulders-knees-and-toes dance.

Your team, because it cannot see the cards, values having as many cards as possible but is not particular about which cards it has. Your country’s objective is to follow the orders of your dictator while trying to gather as many cards as possible.

Team Blue:

All the “red” cards (hearts and diamonds) are incredibly poisonous to citizens of your country. Your entire culture revolves around limiting the possible contagions of these lethal red cards. Groups of people represent a potential contagious threat, so your culture stays as spread out as possible. People being near other people makes you very anxious, and you try to avoid any groups or pairs of people. Someone approaching you directly is seen as very threatening, so you always approach someone at an angle. For example, instead of walking towards someone, you would walk to a point five feet to their left or right. If someone comes straight at you, you flee.

Your entire language is designed to communicate the one most important thing to your country, so you have only developed two words, which are the only two words you are allowed to use: “No red.” You may say it with any inflection or gesture you like, but you can only say, “No red.”

Because you do not like to congregate in groups for any reason, even to elect a government, any member of the team can make any decision. That means that any “no red” country member can initiate or complete trades with other countries.

You have two objectives: Your first is to purge your country of all the red cards that you started with and make sure no new ones come into the country. Before the activity starts you will want to separate those red cards from the black cards because you will not want to touch them or come near them once the activity begins.

The second objective is that you value cards that are like your people: spread out. Therefore, all the even cards are very desirable to you, and you want to collect as many as possible. To be clear, these are the cards you want: 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, Q of clubs and spades. Any heart or diamond is incredibly toxic and needs to be avoided at all costs.

Team Red:

Your culture is based on hopping. You believe that to have air between yourself and the ground is a good and holy thing. When you want to show approval for something or say yes, you hop. The reverse is also true: when something displeases you or you want to say no, you squat down. The angrier or more displeased you are, the lower to the ground you become.

The more that other people hop, the more you like them, and the more agreeable to them you are. If they hop into your country, you may be so pleased that you give them a gift.

Because the wooden tower is the tallest thing you know, and the most in the air, it is very sacred to your culture. Every time you pass it, it is very important to show your respect by looking at the top of the tower, and outstretching your both of your hands to point to the top of the tower. You view it as rude to pass this tower without performing this ritual, and will have a hard time dealing with people who consistently don’t.

Every time on the clock that ends in “1” is also very sacred to you, because it is like it is pointing to the top of the sacred tower. So every ten minutes, when the time ends in “1,” (i.e. 8:51) your entire country stops what it is doing, gathers as close to the tower as they can, and once everyone from the country has gathered together, hops three times in unison. Be sure to figure out how to keep track of these sacred rituals before the activity begins, because if you miss one, your country will have to mourn for five minutes to atone to the sacred tower.

Your country is not allowed to speak to any other country. It is only allowed to communicate using hopping-style body language. However, to simulate having a common language, all the hoppers are allowed to take each other aside and whisper in English.

To make any official decisions about which cards to trade, your entire country must hold a unanimous vote to try to interpret what the sacred tower would want. If one person disagrees or does not show up, then no action should be taken.

Your main objective is to stay true to your country’s religious rituals, but on top of this, your country also values the face cards more than the others because they are the highest. While carefully observing your rituals, try to get as many Jacks, Queens and Kings as you can. (Aces are not face cards.)

Team Green:

Your entire culture is based around saying “ok.” No matter what somebody asks of you, you try to do it. Even if you know that you aren’t capable of doing something, you agree to do it, try to do it, and then probably fail to do it. If you’re not sure what someone is asking, then you interpret what you think they want to the best of your ability and try to accomplish it. Much of your time will be spent trying to do what other people want. You also must do anything that a fellow country member wants, if they ask for it.

Because you don’t have much need for any other words, your entire language is the word “ok.” You may say it with any inflection or gesture you like, but all you can say is, “ok.” To simulate having a common language, you are allowed to take fellow country members aside and have a whispering conference in English to coordinate your efforts. But, if someone whispers a request to you, remember to say ok to it and to try to do it.

Your main objective is to say, “ok” to everything, no matter how miniscule. If you find time to do anything else, the most “ok” deck of cards is a complete deck. You will work together to try to get a complete 52-card deck. (i.e. the A-2-3-4-5… of clubs, spades, diamonds, and hearts.)

A strategy tip: not everyone knows that you will do anything that they ask, and you don’t have to do anything if they don’t ask first, so it would be good to be subtle about completing everything they ask for or you may end up with no cards to trade very quickly. If this happens, try to find other things to trade with, or interactions with the other cultures that make them want to give you free cards.

Covert Operations in the Shenandoah

2008-08-16T21:52:00.010-04:00

For the months of June, July and August, as a part of my diplomatic duties to the Churchmanistani government, I have been incommunicado due to my sojourn in the quaint mountain region of Virginia. I laughed and played with their native children at a delightful place called Shrine Mont, full of its rustic folk music (one of its premier performers is shown above) and strange creatures:

One of the Shrine Mont locals' favorite traditions is that of the "prank," and since the MAD tribe had graciously opened their arms to me, I felt obliged to help lead a few expeditions myself. Now it so happened that at the beginning of the official pranking season, through way of the sort of activities that the MAD tribe leads its native children in, we had fifty-three raw eggs with which we had nothing to do. So, knowing that our rival tribe St. George's celebrated Easter, we hard-boiled, decorated, and numbered our fifty-three eggs up to sixty. We then gave St. George's an involuntary (though fairly kind) Easter Egg hunt in their campsite and for good measure left a gloating sign, crediting the prank to our other rivals, the Explorers.

Now the creativity and scale of this prank were unheard of in Shrine Mont, and we of the MAD camp were extremely satisfied, especially when the prank's effects spun out in delightful and unexpected ways. For example, one of the St. George's tribe came discussed with me her concern that her crush from the Explorers tribe had seen her raves in the graffiti of her bathroom when he placed his Easter Eggs.

We gave the Explorers and St. George's tribes appropriate time for retaliation, but there seemed to be none, so we decided to take proactive steps to avoid the premature end of the pranking season. We of the MAD tribe then stuffed pants legs and shoes, placed them on their thrones in the Explorers' latrines, and closed the stall doors. This prank was less epic in scale and deception, but we felt good prankstleben, as the German's say, when we heard of an Explorers native child waiting an anxious ten minutes while the scare-crows sat.

Photos are courtesy of Sarah McGrath.

The Clandestine Society of Scotch Whiskey Appreciation

2008-06-01T14:56:00.010-04:00

My trip is winding down with a familial expedition through the United Kingdom, which is just like America except it's older, has a queen, and everyone's ears stick out a bit more. We began by cheering my dad on to run faster than any other sixty-five plus year old in the Edinburgh (inexplicably pronounced Eddinburrow) Marathon.

While the Churchmanistani patriarch recuperated, the rest of the envoy went to the "Scotch Whiskey Experience," one of many High Quality Attractions in Edinburgh, the most frequently touristed part of Scotland. It began with two documentaries (circa 1987) about the production of whiskey. The first film featured an American tourist with a hefty camera and backpack asking inane questions. I silently put my camera into my backpack during that particular film. Each film was in a different room, which we were ushered to by our faithful attendant, Katherine. I began to worry when Katherine abandoned us in the third room, (with no movie screen!) and I became even more alarmed when a GREEN 3-D GHOST appeared at the bar in front of us for our further whiskey edification.

After our lecture by the GREEN 3-D GHOST, (if the picture looks blurry, that's because the spectral ectoplasm make ghosts difficult to photograph) we finally got to the climatic Whiskey Barrel Ride, which involved going past dimly lit mannequins teaching more about, you guessed it, Scotch Whiskey, while a bored Scotsmen droned through the speakers in the barrel. The Experience ended with a lackluster tasting of four mediocre Scotches led by Katherine. Katherine's job intrigues me because it is 4/5 amusement park ride attendant, which is generally performed by a pimpled youth, and 1/5 sommelier, which is generally performed by someone more venerable and aged.

It was all worth it however, because now I am an official member of the Scotch Whiskey Appreciation Society, a clandestine and prestigious Society with innumerable benefits. The next time you see me you should ask about the handshake.

WARNING appendium

2008-05-24T15:11:00.004-04:00

Today I saw one of the best signs I ever have in the restroom for the Edinburg castle, just after making a post about signs, so here is a quick appendium to that post:

If you have trouble reading it, you can click on it for a larger picture, or here are the highlights:

!

FIRE ACTION

RAISE THE ALARM:
SHOUT FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!

...

ATTACK FIRE WITH AVAILABLE EQUIPMENT IF YOU FEEL SAFE TO DO SO

WARNING

2008-05-24T05:05:00.012-04:00

Europe is truly multilingual, which is to say that no one can understand anyone else. Hence, it is important for the signs to communicate as much as possible in their clever pictographs to have any hope of being understood. Generally they aren't, at least by me, though I like to think of what they could possibly mean.

For example, the following might mean no scuba diving or incredibly tall people (unless blue is a permissive color and red is forbidden):

No amputees or overalls:

I wouldn't have figured out this next one if it hadn't been explained to me. The dogs in Munich are all very well trained and tend not to go on a leash and to roam with their owners through stores and shops. They are so well trained because dogs are heavily taxed in Munich, upwards of $2,500 a year depending on the breed. Despite their fine training and breeding, pharmacies need to stay hygienic, so outside their doors they have parking places:

The English eschew other languages more aggressively than any other country, so all the signs are in English, and in their quirky brand of it at that. For example, instead of an "exit" you have a "way out," which seems more philosophical somehow. Anyways, this sign was at an underground station, and I'm fairly certain that it's for real:

If you can't read it, it says "WARNING: ANTI-CLIMBING PAINT USED"

Freedom never lasts

2008-05-22T07:41:00.006-04:00

Today marks the last day of traveling truly as the whim takes me (at least on this trip), for I meet up with a larger Churchmanistani diplomatic envoy tomorrow in Edinburg for a two week excursion in the truly familial style. I hope to continue to post about my past and future travels and share with you the thousands of pictures I've enjoyed taking, though this is what Twain says on that subject:

At certain periods it becomes the dearest ambition of a man to keep a faithful record of his performances in a book [or a blog]; and he dashes at this work with an enthusiasm that imposes on him the notion that keeping a journal is the veriest pastime in the world, and the pleasentest. But if he only lives twenty-one days, he will find out that only those rare natures that are made up of pluck, endurance, devotion to duty for duty's sake, and invincible determination, may hope to venture upon so tremendous an enterprise as the keeping of a journal and not sustain a shameful defeat.

I've given up on the idiosyncrasies of Flickr and have switched to Picasa, which has much more room for my pictures. The real benefit for you, the reader, however, is if you feel cheated at ever having missed one of the brilliant, ever-changing banners, then you can find them all there, dispersed throughout the album of all the pictures ever shown on this blog.

And as you may have noticed, I've continued my series of lion statuary, though I've cheated with a painting in this post.

After a few hours of Renaissance, Byzantine, and classical artwork having to do with martyrs, Mary and Jesus at the Vatican Museum, this gem by Wenzel Peters perked me up:

This rotund cat is hidden near the tower of Pisa:

And this lion is fighting an alligator (crocodile?):

Caption Contest 3!

2008-05-18T16:38:00.005-04:00

Though the quantity of entries to my last attempted caption contest were lackluster, (feel free to add your own, even if you've already posted one) I want to give it another go around. Please post your captions to the following picture in the comments, and become eligible to WIN A FANTASTIC PRIZE!!! If you're shy, I believe it's relatively simple to post anonymously. Though chances are, I know who you are. Here's the picture:

Here's the ambassador's entry: Mary was justifiably distressed by the giant gold dome Dr. No had placed over the city.

The Vatican Museum

2008-05-18T13:19:00.010-04:00

Mark, Erica and I payed an exorbitant fee to enter the Vatican Museum, of which all we knew is that somewhere within was the Sistine Chapel, which everyone is supposed to do while in Rome. Really, Vatican Museums would be a more accurate title, because each wing holds enough to fill a normal museum. We started with the museum focusing on the missionary work in China and Japan over the centuries, which was surprisingly sensitive to the religions and cultures indigenous to those places.

We made our way through the various wings, all the while following signs to the Sistine Chapel. There were so many white classical sculptures, and paintings of Jesus, Mary, Mary and Jesus, and martyrs that to keep ourselves awake and keep the statues from blending into one giant Renaissancey mess in our memory, we made jokes about particular expressions, gestures or oddities about each.

About two thirds of the way through, Erica informed us that she had read that walking the entire museum is about four miles, which I can readily believe, because even half way through I was exhausted. The entire museum, especially the closer we got to the climatic Sistine, was packed with tour groups led by umbrella toting guides that speak into microphones that pipe directly into the headphones of their dazed, meandering herds.

Just before the Sistine Chapel was a surprisingly good modern art museum. Most of the art had Christian imagery, but (don't tell the pope this) weren't necessarily supportive of Christianity. Though with Dali, your guess is as good as mine.

Finally, we reached the Sistine Chapel. The entrance was marked with vague pictographs that seemed to indicate that pictures were not allowed and to remain quiet in the chapel. There were hundreds of tourists in the chapel, and there's really no way short of religion or oppression to keep that many people quiet. One of the three attendants in the huge chapel seemed to have the job to clap irritably every few minutes and say in English, "Quiet, please!" The other attendant ambled among the crook-necked gawkers, trying to catch the covert photographers, at whom he yelled, "No pictures!" in a flat Italian accent and continued his meanderings.

The only idea in my head about the Sistine Chapel was the famous portion where God touches Adam, but the scale of the mural is huge. We spent a good forty-five minutes sitting and staring at the ceiling, weary from trying to absorb the miles of art, and listening while people were admonished for their characteristic chatter and photography.

Innocents?

2008-05-17T14:20:00.003-04:00

An old woman seated us at a table and waited for orders. The doctor said:
"Avez-vous du - vin!"
The dame looked more perplexed than before. I said:
"Doctor, there is a flaw in your pronunciation somewhere. Let me try her. Madame, avez-vous du vin? It isn't any use, doctor - take the witness."
"Madame, avez-vous de vin - ou fromage - pain - pickled pigs' feet - beurre - des oefs - du beuf - horse-radish, sourcrout, hog and hominy - any thing, any thing in the world that can stay Christian stomach!"
She said:
"Bless you, why didn't you speak English before? - I don't know any thing about your plagued French!"

- The Innocents Abroad, Mark Twain

On the train from Bari to Rome Mark, Erica and I found our seats on the crowded train. About halfway through the ride, a portly, unpleasant couple approached Mark and gesticulated vaguely and said over and over, "niney-one" in a hard to place accent. Eventually they pulled out their tickets and pointed to the ninety-one on them and the ninety-one over Mark's seat. Most of Mark's confusion was caused by the fact that never before on our dozen-plus train rides have assigned seats ever been relevant, so to be kicked out of his seat was novel.

After Mark left, I was subjected to sitting across the aisle from this couple, listening to the man breathe audibly and the high whine of his personal fan which didn't seem to relieve his sweating on the air-conditioned train. Eventually I noticed what the man was reading, and upon careful listening, realized they were speaking to eachother in fluent English with a midwestern accent. So convinced were they that Mark spoke no English, that they resorted first to the traveller's charades and grunts we use to try to comunicate with locals, which upon observation, communicate very little.

Cruising the Adriatic

2008-05-16T12:27:00.003-04:00

On the Superfast Ferry from Patras, Greece to Bari, Italy, the following ammenities were offered, which I can readily verify by my own eyewitness testimony:

* Three bars
* Disco Club
* Full service restaurant
* Restaurant a la cart
* Casino
* Several lounges with televisions in various languages
* Pool & hot-tub
* Two children's playpens, one complete with ball pit
* Internet cafe
* Masseuse
* DVD and/or DVD player rental
* Helipad
* Private plane landing strip
* Enough room for at least a dozen trucks and various compact cars
* Warm beds and showers for first class passengers
* Picnic benches on deck exposed to the elements of the open sea for second class passengers

Mamma Mia

2008-05-11T09:04:00.007-04:00

In celebration of that most holy of festival days, Mother's Day, originating in the 12th century B.C. when Moses went to the mount to consult the archangel Hallmark that appeared to him as a flaming box of chocolates, I present to you a series of photos of the only figure to boast a larger number of statues than lions on this fair continent of Europa, every Catholic's favorite mom, the lady in blue, the original Madonna:

And the archangel Hallmark said, "And you shall call your mother on this day, for not to do so would shame her in the eyes of the other mothers, and she has suffered so much already. You shall feel the shame that you do not call her every Sunday, but if you do not call her on this Sunday, then truly I say unto you that you are ungrateful for all she has done."

And when Moses had heard this, he knew it was so and he trembled. He came down from the mount to spread forth the angel's words. But when he came down he found that the people were living hurried lives, heedless of their mother's worry, and Moses became furious.

Moses saw that his people were more concerned with worshiping golden calves than celebrating the archangel's new festival, so he shouted for YAWEH to send a plague on these people, for he was ashamed to be one of them.

- Exodus 95: 4-8 (a) NRSV

And so it was that this holy day started, though it was not observed until millennia later when this apocryphal passage was discovered in the Dead Sea Scrolls in 1954.

I love you, Mom.

Good Work

2008-05-11T08:37:00.002-04:00

As many of you know, my big sis Emily manages the Tanzanian branch of an NGO that works at helping with the HIV crisis there. Small organizations like hers (and especially hers) use money much more efficiently than government programs or multi-national charities that spend large portions of their funds on administration and fund raising. Right now she's faced with budget cuts that directly translate to a loss of services like testing and counseling in her area. As my most fervent fans may have already noticed, I've added a link to her organization in my links sidebar so that it's easy to find and support. Here's the pitch in Emily's more eloquent words:

"But there's a cloud over all the good work that is going on, and that is money. Apart from the field trip (and recovering from my GI problems), I've mostly been in the office, feverishly writing proposals to get us through our fast-approaching crisis. It's frustrating because we're so good at what we do in the villages, so good at delivering and monitoring and following up our services, and so bad at raising money up to now. I mean, we are getting people living with HIV in dirt shacks out of bed and back to their daily affairs and we are getting grouchy old Masai men with four wives to get tested for HIV, and that's the easy part. Things are looking good in the long term fortunately; some of these proposals are sure to pan out (as sure as these things ever are), and we will always have the volunteer program to keep us going. But right now, we are facing down some serious cuts, and we need help. If you can: http://www.sichange.org/home/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=30&Itemid=47"

An update on Human Sculptures

2008-05-09T13:36:00.007-04:00

I met a Polish fellow who is a such a regular at my hostel that the desk attendants defer to him on questions about the area. It turns out that to finance his travels, he poses as a human statue. His outfit is of a garish 19th century gentleman, dressed all in gold with gold face paint. He leans on a cane and holds one hand in the air until a gawker stops to watch for a while, for whom he may wink or slowly change his pose.

Mikel says that in a big city like Berlin it is usually possible to make enough to pay for food, a place to sleep and have a little left over for fun, though I was to polite to ask for a specific number and he was too humble to mention one. He did tell me that he easily paid off his costume within his first outing and that regular costs like face paint are negligible. I asked him if the statues were especially territorial, and he said that most people would respect someone else and find another spot, but if you knew you were a better statue, you could stand near them and look that much better by comparison.

I didn't get a chance to visit Mikel today, but I would guess that he's an excellent statue from the brief pose he gave me and the rugged character of his face. At the Karnival cultural fair, I did see another excellent statue who unflinchingly withstood boos! and little rubs in the noses to the delight of onlookers, which strengthened my respect in the trade.

Lyin' never got you anywhere

2008-05-09T05:01:00.010-04:00

Yesterday was free museum night in Berlin, so needless to say, I saw a lot of great lion statues. If you're tired of lion statues, complain in the comments or suck it up. If you're a lion that feels like he is being unfairly represented, please contact my attorneys before considering legal action.

I forget the name of that greeting card cartoon character that used to be really popular and all you could see were his nose and hands hanging over a ledge, but that's what this lion reminds me of (Update: Kelly reminded me the name of that cartoon is Kilroy):

I like this guy because he looks like one of the monkeys from the Wizard of Oz:

And him because he looks like the cowardly lion from same:

I'll only tell you one more time. It's merMAN

2008-05-07T12:17:00.000-04:00

A continuing photographic investigation

2008-05-07T09:51:00.004-04:00

To continue the popular series of pictures of less than imposing lion statuary, I present to you these four entries:

I begin with possibly the fiercest selection I've seen so far. He appears to be eating, head first, a gentleman who tried to ride him:

Next is a feline with a tendency to castle-lick:

And here is a recovering castle-licker, who lost his jaw on his last licking-jag:

And as my big finale, a lion in the midst of losing a roaring contest and none too pleased about it:

Mind your manners

2008-05-06T11:29:00.003-04:00

I've been intrigued by the various local etiquette rules. If I spent more than a few minutes in a shop in India, the proprietor was duty bound to have a boy run and get tea for both of us. This doubles as a sales tactic to guilt you into staying longer and feeling obliged to stay longer and buy or pay more, but I got the impression that it was also a genuine show of manners.

In northern Germany, it is absolutely essential to ask if it is OK to share the table with you. Even sitting at the McDonald's counter with plenty of seats in between, I was asked.

In Leipzig, regardless of the establishment, they practically yanked any jacket off my back to put it on a hook. Even when I was wearing my grungiest sweat shirt and giving patronage to a less seemly establishment, it was necessary to hand it over or risk shoulder dislocation.

*

The stereotypical teen aged hoodlum of the early nineties had a boom box slung over their shoulder blasting music with disregard to passerby. While going through India, I saw many men playing music on their FM radio capable cell phones. I was treated to tinny Bollywood songs from the man behind me for the entirety of one three hour bus ride. No one else seemed to mind, so I kept my mouth shut, and I thought etiquette for this must not have developed at the pace of the technology, and besides, Indian cities are so noisy that one cellphone hardly makes a difference.

The stereotypical teen aged hoodlum in Europe slings a surprisingly powerful cellphone, blasting music with blatant disregard. Riding the subway in Hanover I stood next to a death metal listening group of teenagers. My German isn't quite up to, "I think it's rather rude for you to force this entire car to listen to your music which, by the way, is terrible." Besides the language barrier, I wasn't sure it was rude. No one else on the car seemed particularly perturbed, and there was a fairly good cross-section of potential disciplinarians: from stern old ladies to rich looking business men. On the D.C. metro, I've seen youth chastised on a regular basis for playing music to loud on their headphones, but apparently no one seems to mind in Germany. Or there's an even larger fan base for heavy metal than I thought.

*

I promise less long winded posts and more pictures once that becomes possible again.

Lost in translation

2008-05-05T08:29:00.003-04:00

NoteÖ I am using a German kezboard for this post, so all Ys and Zs will be interchanged, and some punctuation will be replaced bz umlauted letters. Itäs like a fun puyyle for zou.

Mz trip to Hanover was not as restful as I hoped. With the advent of the summer travel season, affordable rooms have been harder to find, and I inadvertantlz showed up in Hanover the weekend of their annual marathon. With itäs 10,000 runners and 100,000 spectators, I was not spoiled for choice. I ended up sharing a hostel dorm room with Frank. (To be honest, this is probablz where I would have ended up anzwazs.) Frank is a middle aged German man, who grew up and worked in the Socialist GDR. One of the first things he said to me after apoligiying for his English was, ÄWith love, people can understand.Ä

Iäve found Frank to be right during mz travels. With patience, there has not been a single time that a language barrier kept me from doing something I wanted. On the other hand, I have begun to zearn for a challenging English conversation. The less I speak during the daz, the more I want to read a meatz book, or do the Will Shorty crossword in the IHT and just soak mzself in the cultural and popular trivia of American culture and the English language. I can see whz so manz great authors have spent time in Europe. Thereäs nothing like deprevation to breed appreciation and fondness.

After spending an hour before bed talking to Frank in mz bad German while he tried his English on me, Frank became convinced that I was the friendliest person he has ever met. It became impossible to just sit and read in mz Hostel because Frank followed me around like a sad ezed puppz. I think mz attempted cold shoulders did not transcend the language barrier, because I left with his blessing and tears in his ezes.

New layout

2008-05-01T06:26:00.002-04:00

I realized my flickr slide show was only showing 18 photos, which weren't even particularly the best, so if you're interested in more of my pictures, visit my flickr page now in the links section. If you miss the slide show, scroll to the bottom of this page, where it will now reside in its new larger dimensions.

Child Abuse

2008-05-01T04:42:00.005-04:00

I spent yesterday mostly lazing in Munich's beautiful Englischer Gardens. After making a pretty good go at Will Shortz in the IHT, I made my way over to a group of guys playing a game of Ultimate that I planned to show off my American skills to. When I got there they graciously let me into the game of soccer they were changing to. Everyone being barefoot was a fortunate equalizer that allowed me to hold my own. I was playing on a team of Americans studying abroad, and though we agreed to no specific out of bounds, we protested when one of the Germans dribbled around an errant sunbather.

After a brief sojourn watching the river surfers, I made my way to the Haus der Kunst, the art museum Hitler had built to show off the traditional German masterpieces. Now the museum is dedicated to contemporary art and featured an exhibition by Belgian painter Luc Tuyman. Some of his paintings were rather moving, like Still Life above that was his response to September 11th. The paintings I enjoyed least, however, were the abstracts that seemed to be more a success of giving the painting a profound title than artistic merit (in my humble opinion.) For example, Child Abuse:

Nazis are jerks and so are everyone else

2008-04-30T04:48:00.003-04:00

I wrote this post, but it's not particularly funny, insightful, or at least concise, so don't read it:

I went to Dachau on an aberrantly cold and rainy day. What I wasn't expecting is that Dachau isn't just a remote concentration camp, but also a stereotypical prosperous German town. I walked through this serene little berg, looked at their local castle and got pleasantly lost in the streets a little bit.

Then, inevitably, I made my way to the concentration camp. There were buses and buses of tour groups there, mostly high school students because it was during the week. With the foul weather and rambunctious fellow patrons, I wasn't expecting a particularly powerful experience, but the camp, as it was designed to, wore me down.

The Nazis weren't just jerks, but anal-retentive jerks, which makes them even more unlikable to me. Everything is exactly the same size and at ninety degree angles. If a prisoner didn't make his bed exactly ten centimeters high he risked being hung by the wrists for an hour.

The scale of the atrocity at Dachau was such that it is impossible that the residents of Dachau didn't know what was going on. As I walked back to the train station, I couldn't help glaring at the residents despite their young a age. A whole town turned their head and then denied ever having known.

I'm not a lyin'

2008-04-29T03:26:00.005-04:00

My mind is a blank this morning, so I hope you all enjoyed pictures of lions last time. The first is a sassy specimen from Munich, and the rest are three fierce specimens from various Indian royal accoutrement.

Bavaria

2008-04-28T13:07:00.005-04:00

Ah, Munich, capital of Bavarian culture. Home of lederhosen, cuckoo clocks, river surfing, and most important to the culture: beer. So much so, that like the forty hour work week, a government protected right of a Bavarian worker is a liter of beer during the work day (that's about two pints for the ignorant and the Americans.) The average Bavarian, and I am not making this up like most statistics I site, drinks a liter and a half of beer a day. The beer halls have lockers for their most loyal patron's beer steins so they don't have to lug the heavy ceramic and pewter glasses to the hall every day. Yes, every day.

What surprised me most about Munich is not only do people actually wear lederhosen, but it actually looks pretty hip. If I could afford $200 funny pants, I would try to break that in the US.

Now that the weather is fairly spring like, busking musicians are out in force in Munich. Believe it or not, I've seen accordions in most of Europe, but not like the those in Munich. They can burn up a squeeze-box in Bavaria. I also heard one of the most vigorous renditions of Vivaldi's Winter by a string quartet in the main shopping district. When a musician's playing for tips they can tear up a violin.

The Statues that Aren't

2008-04-28T04:57:00.006-04:00

Walking through the main square of any city in Europe, you are bound to see the street statue. Those creepy fellows who make some spare change by wearing something to make them look like statues and then standing as still as they can. The costumes and level of skill vary widely. Some of the costumes are little more than talcum powder on the face and a bad wig. If you look at the "Something to do" post from earlier, you can see the lengths some of these statues go to catch your eye.

They all stand on top of some sort of crate. I'm not sure if that's too make them more visible over the gaggle of slack jawed spectators they expect or if it's part of a street statue code. The statues in the poorer locations tend to be less talented. I'm pretty sure I saw one on his first day in Vienna because he had a miffed expression on his face and he had a hard time standing even normally still.

The thought process to becoming a street statue interests me. I imagine it must go something like this: "Well, I'd like to busk, but I can't juggle, play an instrument, I don't own a calliope or a trained animal, but I bet I can stand really still."

Brussels and the birth of the Atomic Age

2008-04-27T03:37:00.005-04:00

Brussels doesn't take itself too seriously. They embrace the surreal, the absurd and especially comic books. There is a comic book museum, dozens of comics inspired murals, and comic book shops in the ritziest shopping districts. This is not surprising because Belgium has been fertile ground to comics, most notably the birthplace of Tintin, and those of you who don't know Tintin need to either leave the U.S. or wait for the Spielberg movie coming in a year or two.

In 1889 for the first world's fair in Paris, they built the tallest building in the world, the Eiffel Tower. The American response was the magnificent and revolutionary Ferris Wheel that could hold over 2,000 people at the 1893 Columbian World Exposition in Chicago. Fast forward to Brussels very own world's fair in 1958. They wanted to create a revolutionary building that also captured the zeitgeist of hope in the atomic age. Thus was born my favorite building, the Atomium, a representation of an atom crystal magnified 165 billion times. I could not imagine a more perfect building for a city that so embraces its comic book nerdiness. Behold, the ATOMIUM:

(I stole this picture from the internet because I forgot to charge my camera battery.)

The Volkerschlachtdenkmal or SAODBMMSVO

2008-04-26T03:31:00.006-04:00

I took a vigorous walk to the Volkerschlachtdenkmal south of Leipzig, not knowing what to expect except that it had something to do with commemorating a Prussian victory and was rather tall. After visiting the actual monument, I don't have much to add to the physical description except that it has a nice reflecting pool in front of it and plenty of benches and sunny places to sit.

The monument was not crowded, but there were various couples and small groups scattered around the grounds, and almost all of them were sipping beers. There was a particularly rowdy group of teenagers at the entrance to the grounds that were rumping off ramparts and riding bikes down embankments that I had to fight the urge to frown at.

Though I came unprepared to fully appreciate the Volkerschlachtdenkmal (translated Sitting Around Outside and Drinking Brew Monument to Memorialize Some Prussian Victory or Other), I had brought a good book and some leftover Belgium chocolates to munch while I watched the other people and the sunset.

I'm trying to imagine a war memorial in America where they would let people sit around and drink beers. At the American Cemetery at Omaha Beach, a snooty French guard wouldn't let Mark and I eat a baguette within a hundred meters of the grounds. What's so bad about enjoying a well landscaped and scenic spot the way people have for thousands of years? Well, what about the rowdy bunch of teenagers, you might ask. Cause and effect will govern the idiots, because shortly after I picked my sitting in the sun spot a ways away from them, an ambulance arrived at their embankment, so my earlier frowns were vindicated, and the humbled group of teens dispersed.

You will be held accountable for reading the disclaimer!

2008-04-25T11:48:00.007-04:00

The Stasi were communist Germany's secret police and comprised the largest intelligence organization ever. At the hight of the Cold War, 1 in 60 citizens of East Berlin were members of the secret police, and 1 in 6 were informers. So odds were, someone in your immediate family was ready to rat you out for your thought crimes.

The Leipzig Stasi Museum is housed in one of the old central Stasi offices, and still has the smell of Communist bureaucracy. I took some good pictures, but I had to promise the Stasi Museum guard that the pictures were for private use only, so if you are not a friend, family member, or friend of a friend or family member of mine, please do not read the rest of this post. You think no one will know, but the Stasi Museum has eyes everywhere, and they will know, and you will know that they know until the day comes when they come for you and you know for sure that they know, and then no one will know what happened to you except for you and the Stasi Museum!

**********SCROLL DOWN FOR CLASSIFIED PHOTOGRAPHS*****************

As you will be able to tell from the below (CLASSIFIED) picture, the Stasi were masters of disguise and covert deception, which I think is mostly accomplished through mustaches:

The below (CLASSIFIED) uniform belonged to the leader of the headquarters of the Stasi office where the museum is now situated and is shown off daintily by this mannequin:

None of the displays had any English descriptions, so my best guess for this (CLASSIFIED) picture is that Germans used the confiscated audio cassettes as blank tapes for all of their multitudinous bugs and wires:

One of the most sinister things the Stasi did that no one knew about until after the wall fell were the below (CLASSIFIED) smell cloths. When they brought someone in for interrogation, they had them sit on a cloth. With the stress and hot lights, they inevitably sweat a good deal onto this cloth, which they carefully stored in a labeled jar. If they ever needed to find this agitator again, they would pull out the jar and give the cloth to their hunting dogs: