quick update

too many things to type about right now ... including my trip to el a for imagining america that featured a totally happy and nurtuting visit with j.b.w. but first...

it is a glorious day to sit in a small town in southwestern ohio. and in case you may wonder, the glory comes directly from god.

will i ever get accustomed to sitting in a cafe and overhear snatches of conversation about the work for crusade (campus for christ); about bible study; and about prayer life and lists?


really? i am not making this up. and btw: the obama sign that adorned this christian cafe's window is down now. i do wonder what that's about. it probably came down the very second that i was setting the scene about the christian environs here for julia at dinner.

nightime rituals

i spent a significant chunk of time today on the phone with my beloved elsa listening and trying to figure out a plan for myself and my work. what kind of book do i think that i am writing? i am really struggling with this. and the answers to this question directly relate to other pressing matters like pending applications for leave, grants, and a slew of other things. my head is swimming.

i eventually wound up going to yoga to attempt to make some sense of these and many other questions while on the mat. on the way out the door, patricia the teacher asked a gaggle of us if we wanted to get tea. she wanted some company to commiserate about the debate and the election. for everyone of you on the coast who is so sure that obama will win, i can point to a passel of people who are so certain that it will be mccain palin. i sure hope that i am wrong, but still, as i keep typing to donna, we need to practice saying president mccain. such a terribly depressing thought.

i am working really hard on quieting my monkey mind, including new nighttime rituals like drinking tea after yoga and then eating spicy foods. and then watching season premiere of "dexter" because there's nothing like watching a shotime series about a serial killer to calm frayed nerves.

i am wrapping up in my cocoon with a little death cab in the hopes of soothing my self. but perhaps before i officially turn in i will review wendell berry's the pleasures of eating one last time? tomorrow, i begin the unit on food in AMS 205.


"i'll follow you into the dark."

and btw: i have been having some really good practices lately on the mat...that is, i lose myself in the practice. i could use a big dose of yog nidra for sure, but all is well. there seems to be an inverse relationship between my monkey mind and my ability to hold balance poses. it's odd, but i have been really balanced and grounded recently.

bang bang

i have been working way too hard. i am burning myself out. i have overscheduled myself with back to back grading teaching meeting teaching meeting and then a ton of events...attending visiting lectures. (last night tommie smith, today linda gordon), promoting the spring classes and events with honors and scholars students, concert with bang on can all stars with glenn kotche, sweeping my computer for spyware, hosting events for new colleagues and students.

it's an unsustainable pace.

but the good news is that i get to teach american studies classes to undergrads. it's such a relief/pleasure to have the same preps as last year. it's such a relief/pleasure to continue to develop these ideas with undergrads. i get to work out these ideas and projects and to work through it. it's so great. it is always always hard to teach new classes, especially with undergrads. i know how to run a grad seminar...it's a whole different level of work and engagement...but somehow less exhausting than the panic preparations and performances for passels of students scrubbed in sunshine.

i had some real fun working with my storytelling class today on the final thoughts on p.l.a.i.n. janes. we then switched gears and i busted out my topsy turvy little red riding hood doll and asked for a teller to recount the story. one did with gusto. then i used molly bang's picture this to get my students to think about how pictures work. it was fun. they smiled and sighed as i flipped the slides to reveal lil red riding hood disappearing into the woods with the vicious wolf. i concluded by asking them to draw a symbol for the hunter. i liked what they came up with. lots of green rectangles some with axes.

today, as i walked out of linda gordon's phi beta kappa lecture on visual democracy, it was 4 pm and brilliantly sunny. the campus looked like a prozac ad, but without a person in the quad on the hub. not one soul. i turned on my heel and saw two young women seated under the arch. i exclaimed: has the rapture come and i have been left behind? they were bemused and mos def not amused.

i need to remind myself that i shouldn't joke about the rapture on this campus.

i wish that i could drive to ocean city maryland and sit at my parents' place at the beach.

p.s. i am going to suspend my campaign and postpone my debate for friday.

feels like 108 now

by the time i went to yoga last night, my body really felt the 108 sun salutations from the day before.

i learned that the man whom i filed the sexual harassment case against was found guilty of the criminal charges he faced including receiving stolen goods, breaking and entering, theft (of undergarments) and is this a crime? installing spyware on young women's computers. since my exchanges with him were about my computer set-up -- i wonder whether he has been following my keystrokes here? ( i will have it swept to be safe.)

but seeing the news article and hearing the radio piece brings up all that crummy stuff from the beginning of last year and how the institution messed up and how my colleagues' actions were really a disappointment.

i booked my ticket for ABQ in the middle of october and then i go to LA next week. i have really concentrated on staying here and focussing on oxford. i have been here one solid month +/- with no trips to indy or columbus or anything. just here in butler county except when i drove to richmond and liberty in search of flashlights and emergency provisions last week.

i keep looking around here and trying to imagine whether and where i could afford to buy a house and whether and when that would be appropriate. i am sort of down on my loft because the scale is just too big. and two bats is two too many. and i realized last week when i was camping in here that it really feels like camping in here all the time. and i keep it tidy, but it has 100 years of industrial dirt in here. i need to stick it out for the rest of this year, but where is the place for me. in search of a domicile and in search of a home.

i have been ruminating on this and dwelling on a whole mess of negative thinking lately. last night, in yoga, on the mat, while everyone else was working on headstand prep, dolphin and inversions, and i just started weeping. i wasn't sure if i could get it together. i knew for sure i could invert, but could i stop? eventually, i did. but dear me.

dear me.

p.s. i would like to live in michael kors apartment in the village as featured in in style this month.

X-hausted

i am so enervated from allergies. argh. the weather is sunny, mild, dry and pleasant (now that we are mostly recovering from the remants of the hurricane). but the allergens. is it the pollen? the mold? the chemicals for the farming? it's not clear what precisely is slaying me, but jeez.

anyway, today i went along to a public park in clifton, in cincinnati to join other yogis and yoginis in 108 sun salutations as part of the global mala. i find it really hard that we had 108 rounds? it was really pleasant to be in the park. i realized that i have never practiced outdoors under trees. the trees were tall and full and the branches that remained intact were impressive. it was such a treat to look up and point my dristhi to the sky framed by tall branches and green leaves. as i think of it, i cannot even recall what kind of tree it was. the ground was uneven and there were loads of broken twigs and stonest. i kept trying to fish them out from under my purple sticky mat. finally i settled in to a rhythm. i really enjoyed practicing outside. practicing with others. and practicing for peace.

the premise of this project is to promote peace. in our personal lives and in the larger world. it seemed like a pretty grand way to celebrate the autumnal equinox and the un's international day of peace.

we even got to open and close the practice with chanting, one of my favorite aspects of the practice, that is sadly missing from the classes at the rec. except when i go to noon time yoga with brenda and nearly no one else shows up...then and only then do i get to chat in the rec.

it was also a powerful way to close Greek Week, a series of events that has taken on all kinds of new meanings for me at this institution.

breathing in peace
breathing out ...


p.s. it makes me really happy that jonathan adler got married last week. i have long admired him and his pottery and his product lines even if his show on bravo isn't so hot.

as seen on tv!

it's been a busy weekend. i turned down three last minute invitations to dinners and a cocktail party in favor of two longstanding dates. last night, jeff, mel's fiance, turned 40 and we celebrated at the A-List, a bar for grown people in town. i got to chat with some colleagues and neighbors and friends. it was fun to hang out. there was lots of talk about nailing the coffin on the bypass, connector road, a fight that this lot has been waging for years. and i finally caved to peer pressure and offered my first installment for our inchoate co-op grocery store.

this evening, i attended and participated in a multi-generational dinner party/staged reading of "how i became i pirate,"/drum circle. the dinner party was a potluck grill enterprise that was nice. as for the entertainment potion, we all know i have not one lick of rhythm, and i find it to be vaguely problematic to witness so many white men in ethnic print drumming. (is it too robert bly?) so, about the play....robert envisioned and executed a great play with the star, kiefer, ultimately choosing soccer practice over the life and times of being a pirate. i was in charge of special effects -- these include hand-drawn thunderstorm, a mast (that i tore in two on cue), a map and a repaired mast. many of the families there are families i know principally from the market. that is, many sprouts were on hand. it took the lil ones by surprise that i could be at a party and not just at the market uptown on saturday mornings. upon spotting me, one little girl, eva pointed and exclaimed: i make things. i quite like it that children see me and have such a crafty response.

today, we reprised our spanish vocab scavenger hunt at the market...whereby we posted laminated tags with spanish words for objects, colors, and people at the market. except at the one farmer's booth, a new fellow who reported that he doesn't believe in second languages. that's right, you read it. paula held her tongue, but she wanted to tell him that he didn't belong at our farmers' market; that he may be better suited at one of the other two markets in town. but instead she smiled and kept on moving.

i am reminded of how weird my world is here. again, showing up at these parties on my own and making small talk about how many cenimeters she has dialated, how to put up spiced pears for the winter, etc. but i am especially mindful of it because tonight, in my small town, on the indiana side...the side i recently learned is "god's country" where the residents prize their "family values" above all else....tonight, keggers' pub and grub is hosting another cage fight night. as seen on tv.

wait five weeks?

how could i have gone five weeks without writing here?

so how to summarize:

d.c. good time to visit with family and friends. it was such fun to visit face to face with pals. and to eat a load of great food. especially fresh seafood. it was great to practice sometimes twice a day at flow. and it was good to be in such a familiar place.

back to college corner.

back to work at miami.

into the thick of it.

it's been a busy start to year.

i spent the week before school in meetings with fellow american studies members and with a faculty learning community in a retreat. we have a campus center devoted to teaching. they put some money into it too so that if you join a learning community, you attend meetings (a retreat and then monthly workshops/seminars) throughout the year. in exchange for your time, you earn $1000 to spend as research funds/travel money. and the other major thing is that the people in the provost's office really really want junior tenure track people to participate. in fact, if you have struggled with teaching, i understand that they insist you join these groups. i am in for the money and the promise of working with some librarians. it's an okay group of colleagues, at least one is way too self-important (philosopher) and fun and funny other people. but our last meeting lapsed into one of my least favorite genres of conversation: in the spirt of "kids these days.....something about technology....something about spoiled....something about how little they know." i find these conversations way too unproductive. so students use facebook! me too. (so does my mutha for that matter.) i am afraid that way too often faculty members -- especially junior ones -- assume that students should arrive in each of their classes ready to research. somehow we junior people have missed a step about how to teach students to do research. i know for certain that i wrote a lot as an undergrad, much of it wasn't very good, but i wrote a lot and was assigned to read a lot. i didn't really learn how to do historical research until grad school. what do we think that 19 year olds can do? and it's not fun to sit around and make fun of them. okay, it may be a little entertaining, but eventually, it is tired. i have been in way way way too many meetings already this year where faculty get into this groove and it is gross and unwelcome to me. (including in our faculty meetings in American Studies). i do not like it not one bit.

back to work at the sprouts.
i have spent saturday mornings at the market with the sprouts children ... working on local foods and fun with little people. yesterday i realized that i have spent a ton ton ton of time with the market this year. i am glad that i declined to accept the position of president of the council. i will serve on the market council, but preside over the group...no thanks. not now. i have developed some good things for the programming including a great memory match game with pictures of the produce that i have made over the summer. and i should probably do something with this aside from file it under service to the community on my faculty activity report?

back to the classroom.
so far so fine. they laugh at my jokes. i realize that it is hard to win the audience and the argument at 9 a.m. with 45 students shoe-horned into a small room with terrible acoustics.

the storytelling class is fine. they are pretty earnest and pretty literal. there are about three students in the mix whom i admire. i am accustomed to admiring more than this. the others are fine...pleasant, somewhat diligent, fine. but they aren't inspired. those few are pretty fab and often i want to embrace them and suck the goodness from their little selves, but i don't want to be a vampire preying on the young left-leaning students in the class. for example, this year again i developed a program for the september project, david and sarah's excellent library-based collaborative international project that is now in something like >1200 libraries in >40 countries. last year, the students were into it and they were decidedly uninterested in making it a legibly patriotic event. this year, the students wanted star-spangled red white and blue everything. it was a larger, more structured program, but it was very red white and blue. that blue me away.

speaking of being blown away,
the remnants of ike arrived here last sunday with 80 mph winds. i lost power for 48 hours. i had potable water, but it was tepid. no high speed intertubes. no gossip girl. no season finale of weeds. no rachel maddow. no the view. no nothing.

something like 2 million people lost power in the state. many (>100,000) in this region have not had power restored. it's been a terrible mess. and there are loads and loads of downed trees and great damage all over the county.

3,000 students created a scene on monday night at the president's house...was it a riot? a protest? a rally? it seemed more like a party following the accounts of the students i know who went along. ostensibly, a handful of students who live off campus were concerned about school re-opening when so many who live off campus still didn't have power. it ended up being a spectacle that involved crowd-surfing, tree climbing, weed smoking, music blaring, hanging out. it wasn't miami's finest moment. as i gather, no one wanted to miss out -- so they documented it with text messages, snapshots, and quicktime movies. four students were arrested, including a knucklehead i have already tangled with in one of my classes.

two colleagues wanted me to organize some storycircles and follow-up events with the student body to debrief the event. i barely had the wearwithall to get myself fed and cleaned and to campus in the dark let alone being emotionally available to students who were distressed about returning to class. no thanks. i talked about the events with my students in class yesterday but i really don't have time or energy to absorb their concerns about being in the dark.


and now, as i type, i hear sarah palin's stupid self on the radio. it stinks being in a battleground state. i like to follow national politics. ordinarily, i enjoy watching cable news, but it's too demanding and tense to follow closely while living here in the heartland. i should hasten to add that evidently, a number of obama organizers turned out at the president's house on monday night with their clipboards in hand, attempting to register votes and to sway impressionable young people. hey, they reasoned, why not? it's where the people are.



i miss where my people are. and i realize that this is total fantasy in my mind. my own people are scattered across the country. but the point is i am not close to them. to you. i am here in the heartland.

with a very very clean refrigerator with fresh ice and fresh staples and a very full trash and compost bin.