Santiago El Grande

Imagine going to work every day and this being the first thing that you see.

This is none other than Salvador Dali's Santiago El Grande, and its home is the Beaverbrook Art Gallery. I worked there as a student one summer. I was feeling rather nostalgic yesterday. It came after I was reading Kato's post about the Assman, and it then I started transgressing into a thoughtpool of overly romanticised memories. That was my summer of '69, except there was no Woodstock and it was in the early 90's. Return to the Dali for a second. The image does this painting no justice. It would be impossible to remove this from the building framed. If you notice the figure standing in the right hand corner - most average sized people stand eye to eye with it. It is slighly smaller than life size - that figure in the corner.

That was a very cool job. It was a government make- work program. I didn't have anything real to do - I just created work for myself. I poured through art magazines and updated collections files. My office was also in the Vault. I had a little radio in there and I'd listen to This Mortal Coil, while sitting with every other painting not hung in the galleries. At any time I could hang out with a Joshua Reynolds, or an Alex Colville or a Lucien Freud. I also remember being bored stiff at times...and having a hard time staying awake in the morning. (I had a very active nightlife).

That was the summer just prior to the unleashing of the grunge movement. Let's keep in mind that we lived without the internet, cable TV and far far away from the closest urban centre (Which was either Montreal or Halifax depending on which scene you were into). We didnt have a car...and I remember pining frequently about going to the beach. If we wanted a music scene, it had to be created. That was the nice thing about it - so there were small punk concerts featuring Eric's Tripp, Skeleton X, The Exploding Meet...and my gang would mostly hang out and listen to Eno, Tom Waits, Sting, Peter Gabriel's Passion. We wore lots of black of course...this was before everyone went flannel and a long time before tatooing and peircing became mainstream. I also bought my first pair of Doc Marten boots...black 8 holes...from the money I made at the Art gallery...*sigh*.

I lived in this rambling ramshakle of a house that we called "The Casa Des Butthole". There was much illustration on this matter...mostly involving neon and blinking lights. Soon everyone in the neighbourhood knew the name. I can't even remember the address. I lived with a fellow named Dana. No relationship other than roomates. Our first conversation involved how he was getting his penis tatooed. I knew then I was in for the weirdest living arrangements ever. Incidentally, I never saw said tatoo. I think he had a bumblebee and a butterfly. He also was an antique knife dealer. Most of this information never went home to mom, she'd never believe that he was stable and mostly normal - and did the dishes and kept out attic kitchen neat and tidy.

Okay okay...enough nostalgia. Its fun to go back...I also remember being poor most of the time, and thinking that we had the most boring existence ever. We were Gen X-ers of course...nothing could have made us happy! Today I'm going to put on my kick-ass sandals and rue my Docs. They are somewhere in my basement...I havent been able to part with them yet. Maybe I'll get them bronzed and pass them on to the kids...you know a memento of when mom was cool. That ought to go over well when they are 16.

New Shoes

Kim has been wondering what I have been doing - since my ritualistic grading ordeal is over. I'm busily preparing for an intersession course on Health, Healing and Religions. This is the course where I am going to get all my students to blog. It could be very cool - or a fiasco. The nice thing is that intersession is only a month long, so if the blogging stuff sucks, we're all off the hook in 16 or so classes.

I've been writing much lately. I've been working on my course outline, and a "Short Treatise on Blogs" which, if you are interested, you can read here. Basically, I explain why I want to use them, and some general criteria. I generally try and avoid rules, but sometimes, and I hate to say this, students will try and get away with the least amount of work possible. I've been taken advantage of in classes before. Not all students are like this...but I have been burned. Actually, I'll put it this way: The rules are for my benefit. It reduces my penchant for nagging.

I've also been writing about Science, Magic and Religion. I am actually getting very into it. I am going to do the reading, writing (blogging) assignments with the class. I'm giving "teach by example" a whirl. It's part of my strategy to encourage students to really get into the material. I have been finding that within the framework of Health, Healing and Religions - there is this opportunity for dialogue between scientific and religious/spiritual paradigms. I find this all very fascinating - but I will save the conversation for my "other" blog. (Polyblogamy remember?)

I editted, reworked, rewrote, spell and grammar checked that treatise on blogs at least 5 times. Writing does not come naturally or easy for me - and I get to a point when I am so intimate with my own work that everything stops making sense. I focus very intensely on the particulars - is this a proper sentence? How are my tenses? Is there a subject? An Object? Are there split infinative...and am I commiting a horrific gramatical crime? At some point, grammar rules dissolve and I become disoriented. I think I have explained some of my love/hate relationship with writing. I think my worse offense, is using too many words - I usually write something in 12 words when only 6 will do. And I naturally tend to water down my oomph. Well that directly reflects my pansy-ass nature. Really, it does. I am a pansy. Chicken SHIT...bwaaaak! cluck cluck!

I caught a student cheating the other day. (I am about to demonstrate my pansy-assness.) So, I contact the Chair of my dept, report the incident, and he in turn reports to the Academic Vice President (which is like the Provost in U.S terms). Anyway, the Chair and I decide to take no further action - this student was going to flunk regardless of his cheating. I was hesitant in pursuing a full blown investigation - because the student he copied was not in cahoots. I am 99.99% sure. Anyway - I did not feel it was fair to put this other student in a stressful situation - when he did absolutely nothing wrong. So, today I was having coffee with a colleague of mine and recounted my tale of woe. She encouraged me to tell this student that I caught him - to not let him get away with it. I suppose, looking at the big picture (you know the one without the frame), he didn't. He just is under the illusion that he did. So, I sat down today and composed the coldest most formal letter I could muster. My stomache was in knots. I hope he shits his pants.

So I have been reflecting on my wimpiness lately. I decided the best way to remedy that situation was to buy a new pair of shoes. Seems like the right thing for a girl to do. I got shoes to kick ass. Maybe if I dress the part, my attitude will follow. There is always hope eh?

The Stills

Lets all breathe a collective sigh of relief, shall we? Grading is over! All that remains is submitting the results on-line. I like to put a couple days between finishing and submitting - just so any residule anger, disappointment, or euphoria will not challenge my original findings. But, this post is not about grading.

Robin mentioned something about unpaid advertising. I sensed it was almost a bad thing. Robin, if you held no judgement about it, I apologize. BUT, that bit of conflict had me thinking...

(Not a great segue...I've had better days)

The Internet has fundamentally changed the way I listen to music. Eric has some of the boytoys aquired prior to our meeting still hooked up. What a shame - I don't think he foresaw the dramatic electronic revolution on the horizon. The speakers serve as plant stands. The Sony 5 CD player rarely gets used. I usually make a Hallowe'en CD of spooky music and pipe it out to create the right mood for the trick-or-treaters. That is the last time I recall using it. We used to have a Sony dual tape deck, but we didn't even take it out of the box when we moved here almost 3 years ago. Kids and tapes are a real bad idea, incidentally. Think TP-ing but with your favorite recording all over the livingroom.

I suppose if you thought about my relationship to music based on this paragraph, you'd conclude that things came to a halt right about the last time I attended Lollapalooza in '94. It could very well have stopped there. I'd say my interest in music went on hiatus. Without Cable TV and alternative radio, I could be a thirty-year old housewife with a taste for retro. Actually, I think I'd live in a musical vacume. Most of my pre-mom and wife stuff has disappeared, and they might have been replaced with The Best of Barney and Disney's Greatest.

The internet has given me back that opportunity to self identify with music. It is so much easier folks! Now I don't have to slog through 90% of the music that radio stations think I ought to like. My method of discovery: I google "best albums 2004" and just surf out all the lists. I don't care whose list, any list will do. I find a band that has an interesting name, or choose one that happens to make more than one "Best of" list, check out their website, sample what they have to offer and then use my P2P program and see what I can come up with. With that being said, I think I owe some free publicity to those gracing my online playlist. For allowing me to regain my sense of musical adventure, I'll give all the free advertizing one would be willing to listen to.

One day last summer I found a Montreal based band "The Stills" on a couple best of 2003 lists. They had their entire first album on-line. Genius! I listened and I liked. This was at the same time my 4 year old developed a keen interest in music and the internet. Instead of letting him listen to the Best of Barney, I made him his own playlists - some fun stuff - Bob Marley, ELO, Cheap Trick, The Pixies...Harry grew very attached to The Stills, and figured out how to surf to their website and played the song Fevered over and over and over and over again. For a couple of months he would attend to this obsession while his mother gladly supported it, and even thought it was the coolest thing since he first learned how to google search.

Lets just back up here and insert a bit of tangential bragging. Keep in mind that Harry just turned 4 years old last summer. He mastered effective and basic oral communication the year before and quickly understood that learning your ABC's will allow you to search anything you want on Google. My husdand and I are often wide-eyed in astonishment when we inventory the skills he quickly mastered to use the computer. This clearly demonstrates that the Vygotskian Pedagogical theory trumps Piaget

So, one day this fall, Eric was away and I was spending a routine evening with the kids. Harry came and sat on my knee as I was idylly surfing the net. He asked me to see the Stills. I obliged. Then he said "I want to talk to the Stills mommy". Lightbulb moment. I surfed my way over the the "Contacts" link and told Harry we were going to talk to the Stills by sending them an E-mail. He was psyched.

Subject: 4 year old fan

Seriously!

I am Harry's mother, and since he can neither type nor spell I
offered to help. But, he loves the Stills and wanted to say

"Hi"

(mom: Whats your favorite song?)

Harry: Fevered. I like to say Hi to the Stills...
Mom: You just did. Want to say anything else?
Harry: Yeah
Mom: What do you want to say?
Harry: I love the Stills
Mom: Are you all done?
Harry: yup
Mom: Do you want to say bye?
Harry: Bye! See you in the song! Bye! And say I love you.

I don't know how else to convey that this was an authentic
conversation...

Thanks for your time

Heather, mom to Harry

And that was that. Harry and I had our fun, and some PR guy reading the fanmail would get a snigger that someone out there on glue had the nerve to pose as a 4 year old to get some attention.

Three days later, I see a message from "The Stills" in my inbox. For a minute I thought that it was one those automatic replies. You know, a "We love all the attention, but don't have time to attend to all the peasants in musicland". Oh no...it was better - much, much better:

Hey Heather,

That's really cool. Tell Harry that we are happy that he likes the
stills and when he is older we would love to meet him. Here is a
picture you can show him of me!

thanks for writing very cool and unusual e-mail!
cheers
oliver

How cool is that folks? Now there is a letter to tape into his baby book. And the picture, was one of the Stills basist Oliver Crowe. Harry was thrilled. Mom was more. Come on, this is a defining moment in motherhood...encouraging your child that much closer into the realm of cooldom.
Harry has moved on to other interests, such as pointing to a logo and asking "Is that a corporation?" (which really sounds like "is that a corponation"). But every so often he'll find www.stills.net and I will hear Fevered over and over and over again.

My Playlist

Who said Grading Had to be tedious? Well it is. So here is how I have been lightening the mood: On a recent episode of Definately Not the Opera on CBC radio, there was a documentary about how some celebrities have been publicizing their IPOD playlists. The host then asked the question that are these really their playlists? Did they not leave out some rather unpopular and maybe embarassing selections...like a hidden penchant for Milli Vanilli? Don't our playlists reveal deep seeded personal secrets?

So here is my playlist...uneditted. (Except for the italics and bold):

Music for films - Brian Eno
Into the Mystic - Van Morrison
Sultans of Swing - Dire Straits
Instant Karma - John Lennon
St. Dominics Preview - Van Morrison
Hell is Chrome - Wilco
Big Fish - PJ Harvey
Biko- Peter Gabriel
Loomer- My Bloody Valentine
Subterranean Homesick Blues- Bob Dylan
Under Stars - Brian Eno
Fevered - The Stills
Peking Saint - Cat Power
Animals and Insects - The Stills
Aragon - Brian Eno
Communique - Dire Straits
The Soul Cages - Sting
Spider and I - Brian Eno
Inaudible Memories - Jack Johnson
No One Recieving - Brian Eno
Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy - Brian Eno
Everything Merges With the night - Brian Eno
Life During Wartime - Talking Heads
No Sense -Cat Power
Why Do I Lie? Luscious Jackson
The BellDog - Eno and Cluster
Sweet Thing - Van Morrison
Starman - David Bowie
Karma Payment Plan - Modest Mouse
Space Oddity - David Bowie
Angel Won't you Call Me? - The Decemberists
Built in Girls -The Wrens
Apology Song - The Decemberists
Hey Julie - Fountains of Wayne
Message in A Bottle - The Police
Maps - Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Fortress Around your Heart - Sting
I fall up -Brian Eno
Cyprus Avenue - Van Morrison
Cocaine - Eric Clapton
Walk Alone - Jack Johnson
Space Oddity - David Bowie
Rain Dogs - Tom Waits
The City is Here for You to Use - the Futureheads
Space Between -Dave Matthews Band
Imaginary Love - Rufus Wainwright
Land of Anaka - Peter Gabriel and Brian Eno
Mantra- Tool
Fort Knox, King Solomon - Bob Mould
Astral Weeks - Van Morrison
Juju Space Jazz - Brian Eno
Thumbtack - Bob Mould
Synchronicity 1 - The Police
Sweet Mistakes - Ellis Paul
Its All Understood - jack Johnson
Over Fire Island - Brian Eno
Energy Fools the Magician - Brian Eno
Road to Nowhere - Talking Heads
Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell- Modest Mouse
The Roil, the Choke - Brian Eno
Where are You Going? - Dave Matthews Band

*************

And yes, I love Brian Eno. Thats nothing to be ashamed of.

I think I've found the soundtrack for my Blog! Check it out!
The Frames new Album "Burn the Maps"

Lost: Blog Somewhere on the Internet

• Lost: The Pilgrimmage of Litany. Last seen Yesterday making cheeky comments about her travelling companions. Spotted somewhere in the blogger vicinity. Wearing Grey and Burgundy stripes. Responds to the name of Lit...very friendly. Can be easily coaxed with Coffee and Star Wars Spoons...
  

Has anyone seen her? The link on my blog doesnt work, so I tried to link from Robin's. I link back to my Blogger dashboard. Huh?

Does anyone know that she is stuck in a virtual bubble? Who can help? This looks like the job for an intrepid internet superhero. She won't be wearing S+M inspired gear, pleather stillettos nor carry any exotic weapons (not even a lasso). I don't think she'd need to hide her super-hero tendencies to her colleagues at her run of the mill job either. Anyone know VirtualGrrrrl? She needs to free Litany from Webcaptivity - being held hostage by evil programmers. Perhaps a seedy trucker along the Dalton highway is involved.

Where are our modern day heros, I lament.

Sorry, I had to Again

Thanks to my fellow literary blogoddess Kim

And editted to add: I am a good cook and I don't need to hook-up - just in case you were curious

---

I am a hybrid of: Academic Girl Indie Girl Progressive Girl Click on the pictures below to read more: Take the 'What Kind of Girl Are You?' quiz at CookingToHookup.com

Sorry, I just had to

You Are a Snarky Blogger!

You've got a razor sharp wit that bloggers are secretly scared of. And that's why they read your posts as often as they can!

What kind of blogger are you?

Einstein's Genius

well, I let my tangential blabber power get the best of me. I didn't really get to the point of Einstein did I?

I told you it was a long story...

There is nothing more irritating to a doctor or psychologist than a mother who calls their diagnosis into question. I learned very quickly how to dance and skirt around the issue without offending the doctor's professional pride. In the end I think I prevailed. This label has been ostentiably dropped from the consciousness of those who work with him on a daily basis - his teachers, T.A's and Resource Teachers. Owen still has challenges regarding language - so I do not deny that he needs assistance in those areas. I may deny the "A" label, but I still see him as is a square peg in a round hole. As you can see, I consider Owen's "diagnosis" to be an empty label devoid of any inherent meaning and content.

At some point,( I think it was before he started school, ) I came to believe that Owen's brain architecture was different than most. That did not mean that he was "disordered", "diseased" or "disabled". Sometimes the educational system is quick to medicalize difference. Sadly, I think this is the only way they can justify getting assistance in the school system. At least, in the school district where Owen attends, they do not have the personal or financial resources to tailor their curriculum to every child. Owen happens to be on another curve. He also is highly adaptive.

Enter Einstein. Somewhere along the way, I found out that he did not learn how to speak until he was 4, and did not speak well until he was 8. There are many who would advocate that Eintein was a high functioning autistic. That interpretation did not matter to me as much as that one isolated factoid that he was a late speaker like Owen. And if Albert Einstein could develop the theory of relativity, while working in a Swiss Patent office, think of Owen's possibilites. Owen has as much chance to turn our understanding of matter, space, time and reality on its head. Who knows what all that gazing and studying geometric patterns will develop into? His oddness, I find completely exciting...not something to be feared, or worse "cured".

So Thanks Albert Einstein. You not only altered my understanding of subatomic phenomena, but you also radically reshaped the way I interpret my kid. That is your genuis my sir.

Einstein, The Golden Mean and Owen

Another diversion. I can tell its about time to start grading again...I am getting more and more distracted.

And Robin, I'd gladly take your exams. I am not all that sure you want my performance recorded on your official transcript, however.

Kim...thanks for visiting my 'Scholarly" blog...it was getting pretty echoey in there!

Side note: Ever hear of a ganglion cyst? I have one on my wrist. It acts up during marking season every year - since it comes from repetative strain from using the computer. Yup. Grading has workplace hazards. I wonder if I'll be able to squeeze workmans comp out of it? Well duh! Of course not...I don't even get health benefits for educating our future's intellectuals.

So, it seems that I am in Anniversary mode. last week was Terry Fox. I needed to do that...his story plays heavily into my Canadianness and weaves in some father/daugher sentimentality as well. I get terribly nostalgic about my father.

But not this week. Today Marks the 50th anniversary of Albert Einstein's death, and nears the 100th Anniversary of his Relativity Theory. I have a special fondness for Al. I mean, he must have been impossible to live with. Look at the hair. There were definately creatures contemplating quantum mechanics up there too. And who can forget that classic picture of him sticking his tongue out at the camera? What ever happened to nutty professors anyway? Suddenly the world seems way too serious these days.

Why Einstein. Well, he was a beacon of encouragement for me a couple of years ago. So, I am taking time out of my busy marking schedule to officially pay homage to Time Magazine's person of the century...to say "Thanks, Man".

When my 7 year old son Owen was 3, he was diagnosed with Austistic Spectrum Disorder. More specifically, he was labelled as having PDD-NOS - Pervasive Developmental Disorder Not Otherwise Specified. I spent a good majority of the following years researching this diagnosis, and a good amount of time, frustration and stress attempting to have this diagnosis removed. This is a huge narrative. Someday I'll find the time to get it all into writing. But for the time being, I am going to use grading as my excuse and provide you with the Readers Digest version for the time being. In a nutshell, PDD-NOS means "this case does not fit neatly in the criteria for autism or Aspergers in the DSM-IV". Owen just happened to be so liminal that it really depended on the way you looked at him. I worked very hard to get people not to look through the label. Why was he given this diagnosis? He was a late -talker, and all kinds of behavioural issues stemming from his lack of expressive and receptive language. He also had some queer kinds of habits. Spinning things. Fascination with 90 degree angles, and constructing things that were 90 angles and he could spin. I later came to appreciate that he was unknowingly fascinated with the Golden Mean. This sort of thing was easily dismissed as a classic symptom called "persevatating". I was keen on letting him study this abstract concepts quickly before he mucked his brain with language. Imagine being able to visualize and conceptualize geometry without needing to interpret it through language? Fascinating stuff to this geek mom.

But none of the psychologists would see it my way.

(to be continued...off to do some grading)

Just to remind you: I am still playing hookie. In fact, at this very moment, I am procrastinating. I just started grading my two courses...and the mountain of reading and evalutation seems like I am sitting in Kathmandu looking up at Everest...its such long way up...and will be painful getting there. And when I get there...I have to start all the work over again (and do course #2).

Our littlest one is extremely sick. He has a flu/Norwalk virus. For two days he vomitted and dryheaved, 2 days after he had a desperate cough and trouble breathing and after a trip to the ER, a double ear infection and swimmers ear. Poor guy. With his lack of appetite, he also had a bout of constipation. Oh, and he fell down and scraped his face too. He needs some better karma. So far, he's been parked on the couch and watching movies. You know a two year old is sick when they don't get off the couch. You know they are that sick when they won't even eat cookies. Its that bad. Poor feller.

Of course I am afraid that I will suffer the same demise - especially when I am under tight deadlines - I need to get my grading done this week, and then I only have next week to get my Intersession course together. Having the flu from hell would be just my luck...and throw a serious wrench into my schedule. Of course it could be much worse. Have you read what's happening in Angola with the Marburg Virus? Very scary. People are hiding their loved ones from medical aid workers (who want to quarantine them) - its not contained yet. These things freak me out. Heck with the four horsemen of the apocalypse...I fear the plagues. Locuses would not be fun either.

Okay...I am rambling. Nothing insightful or cheekie today folks. The papers are calling me...taunting me...teasing me...ugh. For all you folks bemoaning your examinations: the other side of is just as evil. You may spend three hours in an examination - I spend five times that with the same questions and the range of brilliant to desperate responses....

I'll take all the pity I can get

Remembering Terry

I have been cheating with another blog. But don't worry Big Picture....we're into polyblogamy, aren't we?

I've popped in for a reason.

Side note: I'll resume fulltime spewage once I get my course behind me.

Yesterday marked the 25th Anniversary of Terry Fox's start to his Marathon of Hope. I suppose its not like me to get all sentimental, but we all have our moments.

I was 10 years old when Terry started. Memories of that time very much include my father, who was instrumental in teaching me about Terry's awesome task. Maybe this moment is so wrapped up with thoughts of my dad that I am mourning for both their passing. Who knows, we're such complicated creatures. I don't have any specific memories of Terry Fox back when I was ten, except for a poster my dad gave me, which I proudly hung in my room. His moppish hair, his awkward, yet determined gait, his iron-on T-shirts, adidas shorts, running at dusk in the mist and that song (oh that cheesy song!) "Run Terry Run!! Run Terry Run!" are now iconic, representing hope, courage, determination, and bittersweet disappointment.

I can recall the day my mother telling me that Terry had to stop running. "But why? He is only half done!" Then she told me the cancer had come back and he had to stop. The cancer coming back was not part of our plans I think I feared that he would lose his other leg, and not be able to finish. Little did I know that it spread to far graver places - his lungs. I watched the CBC archives of Terry announcing that he had to stop because the cancer had spread. We all felt his utter disappointment. We all wanted him to continue soon. I was young enough to think he would.

Vague are my memories of his death. Yesterday I thought that his journey would have been hallowed by Canadians from Coast to Coast to Coast regardless of the outcome. Its somewhat satisfying to think that he would have recieved as many accolades for dipping his artificial leg in the Pacific. When I think of Terry Fox, I see him struggling in the rain, his rhythmic thump-thump-pull, those curls. Today I think he was just a kid. Just a kid. Just a kid with a dream.

I'm Distracted

Mad Scientist in the making: the IT guy installed B2Revolution on the University system. Pretty cool huh? I feel like pioneer and I am letting it all go to my head. I want to blog about my experience - so that I can share that to anyone who is interested as well.

So, I've been noodling around and find that I can commit myself to only one blog at a time. I am already framented as it is....mom/wife/prof/blogger/maid/cook/...to add another alter ego is too much for my fragile being.

If you're really interested...and I mean really really keen, e-mail me and I'll send you a link to my new stuff. And I'll slowly defrag my identities...

samsara_mom@yahoo.ca

Just don't e-mail the prez and tell him I cuss.

H

New territory here on Campus

The teaching term is coming quickly to an end. As I write this I am furiously planning my next course, starting May 1. On our particular campus, there are two divergent groups of faculty using technology. The hegemonic group use a courseware package called WebCT. I've dubbed it WebJail. It a web based interface which allows professors to create online tests, collate and submit grades, host discussion boards and chat. I am sure it has other bells and whistles. I never go there so I am recalling WebJail from my initial exploration in September. Why does WebJail irk me so ? Noone can access any of the information from a particular WebCT site unless they are enrolled, or teaching that class. I suppose some of you may find that sort of enclosed virtual space to be safe and comforting. I find it extremely frustrating. If I want to learn how another professor is using technology in the classroom, I'd have to ask her to explain it to me, rather than just e-mail me a link. I also think there is an inherent danger of having a hidden and secret messageboard. Sure it eliminates trolling, but there is no opportunity for other interested faculty and students to participate in a healthy academic discussion. If a student is thinking about taking a course from Professor X, why can't they check it out? So that is my WebJail rant. I don't lock my students up. I have them create simple websites using Mozilla and they post all their work on the web. I am part of the marginalized group of professors who are interested in redesigning and rethinking classroom boundaries.

I am not so sure I want my personal blog to officially coincide with the professional website. I am not all that concerned about what you may think of my "other" work, but I do not want my blog associated with the insitution I work for. Since my position at said university is often tenuous, I feel I don't need to add any more reasons to not hire me back each year. In addition, I like being able to say what I want on my personal blog . I have all kinds of student related issues that I'd love to ruminate over, but I am still undecided about the ethical implications of processing them here. Even though I don't name names, I feel that I am consciously being careful.
So, its official, I am dancing around a couple of issues.

Blogs about blogging and technology can be dry as toast. I officially reached nerd status yesterday. I spoke with the resident renegade at the IT dept at said insititution yesterday (who has access to everything, and weilds some power, albeit silently). I explained my interest in developing a blog for my course that I will start at the beginning of May. He was keen on helping me usurp the domination of WebJail. First, I had to decide on some Blogging softeware that he could establish on the University's system. Now that I am writing about this - I feel like I am "going where no academic has gone before" . Waaay cool.

So I narrowed my choice (inset link later) to Moveable Type and B2Evolution. Some of the choices were rather random. I don't need many bells and whistles. The simpler the better infact. I also felt that it was important to be able to create categories - which is something that Blogger does not do easily.

Thats the technical angle of blogging in the classroom. Tay tuned for the next phase - how am I going to make this course work?

chatter of joy

Might I remark that the daylight savings is EVIL. I used to be soft on that word, relegating it to Pop culture cynicism. Now EVIL is that feeling when your mind thinks its been up since 6:30am -- but your body knows it was 5:30.

I seem to spend more time complaining about my kids than I do praising them. I suppose if one were to try and understand my life though my blog you'd imagine me with three out of control kids. You would be partially right. When I am happy with my kids, I am with them. When my tolerance for fighting, whining, nagging , pooping, farting, mooning, swearing wears thinner than Donald Trump's comb over, I blog. The result is my incessant whining and/or complaining. And being that I am the only adult in the house (until tonight!!) - I need some touch of sanity...or at least a repository for my angst.

(Transition to tangentially related topic here...)Each of my children possess some sort of security item. Owen has a rainbow coloured cow we call Mr. Moo, Harry has a blankie, which also doubles as a cape, and Aidan has Ed, the toy horse. I went through a 10 minute tidy after supper and placed Ed on a shelf so I didnt sweep him with the inordinate number of crumbs that accumulate on my floor each day. A couple minutes ago, I heard Aidan chatter with joy. His speech is still very much in transition from late Neandertalish to a more modern form of Japanese. Still, a chatter of joy was a chatter of joy.

And now my house is back in ruins and I realize that bedtime has officially arrived.

I have officially run out of steam. My last day of classes is FRIDAY and I am not sure how I am going to make it intellectually until Tomorrow...

Chaos, my constant companion

Why the microscope on mistakes, imperfections and flaws? I've come up with a number of reasons for why they exist, and their none of their discoveries have come with any prepackaged solutions. At first, I came to understand that I had quote "low self esteem". There were things I tried to raise it - drugs being the most fun, And here I don't mean zoloft or prozac.

I don't publically recommend the high life, nor do I advocate it as "the" solution for low self-esteemism. However, "hot-knifes for breakfast" were on the menu for a good three or four years in my early twenties. And people, I ain't no heroin junkie, cokehead or crack addict. My overindulenge with marijuana was the limit to my big intellectual experiment. Now that I need to live a highly routinized existence, I no longer can fit it in, so I don't. So, I didnt quit because I had some great moral revelation, I just don't have the time to sit around and be high. ANYWAY. The drugs did help. Being introspective for much of my early twenties really allowed me to explore these issues, and I did manage to quit choosing men who were bad for me, so I call that an accomplishment.

That was a tangent if I ever did see one.

Lately, I have had some new insight into my baggage. Well, maybe if I better describe it so you know what I mean. I have a shit opinion about myself: " I'm not smart enough" and "I am lazy", are the two dominant themes to my self depricating tape loop. Frequently I notice, especially when driving, I remember past situations that make me wince. Usually these are memories involving me feeling stupid about myself. So I have tried many things to exorcise my demons: an archaeology of my childhood experiences, affirmations, cognitive retraining...
and I have never found a reasonable answer for why I feel the way I do, or how I came to be so. I came from a stable 2 parent home, who both doted on me. I think part of it may come from the fact that I am terribly dyslexic. I didn't discover that I until I was in university and I was reshelvling books the wrong way at the library where I worked part-time. Did THAT ever annoy my boss. I realized to my credit, that I accomplished much without ever knowing. I had the highest average in my graduating class, maintained a full 4 year scholarship, was on the deans list 3 of 4 years.... Obviously, this was no "disability" in the true sense of the word. I might add that nothing came easy. I think in that struggle, I convinced myself that I was stupid because it was consistently such a challenge.

I still haven't articulated that new insight that has recently come to me. I've realized I am a perfectionist. (DUH!) But in my perfectionism I easily become paralized at the thought of doing something, and not doing it "perfectly" that I end up avoiding it for as long as I can. I think perfectionism manifests so I can feel some control in my environment, since my dyslexia has a chaotic effect. My first response to new situations - new cities, computer code, lots of words on a page - is panic. My brain always wants to start somewhere else...

So maybe I have discovered some causation. In the end it doesn't really make the present any different. So, perhaps my rather depressing expose offers some explaination as to why Pema's stuff suddenly has taken on such meaning for me. I need to reteach my brain. Meditation has helped me catch my wayward thoughts, and instead of wincing, I try at least to note that those thoughts are "just thoughts" and part of my humanness.

I've been lustily tapping my fingertips together

Before I commence my daily banter, I want to extend a hearty thank-you to all respondees. Thou art Linked...or I am getting around to it.

Okay Class, turn to Chapter 3 in Pema's Wisdom of No Escape. You will recall that this is a series of lectures given at Gampo Abbey concerning Maitri, or loving-kindness. I decided to use this text to reflect on the many perils and complexities of parenting three precocious and oftentimes farcicle little boys. In addition, I vowed to be as respectfully irreverant as I can.

This particular chapter deserves to be read in its entirety. Its' chock full of gems. I've been lustily tapping my fingertips together waiting for that moment when I could scribe this online. Basically, its about our need to be perfect, the best. In conversation with her guru, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, he advices:

"I'm always suspicious of the ones who say that everything's going well. If you think that things are going well, then its usually some kind of arrogance. If its too easy for you, you just relax. You don't make a real effort and therefore you never find out what it is to be fully human"

I think not being "fully human" involves those tendencies to repress, ignore or try to change those "imperfect" aspects of ourselves. I have a couple suitcases full of them, don't you? Additionally, those imperfections are really just projections we impose on ourselves. They are mostly imaginary. To be fully human means not hiding the baggage. Yep, its me in the airport, with suitcase open wide and everyone looking at my size large underwear. We all have them, in all sizes and varieties, and we wish to conceal them by stuffing them somewhere between the socks and the travel alarm.

Pema continues by saying
"as long as you have these kinds of doubts your practice will be good". (p. 9)

In fact, she tells us, that our practice ought to in some ways feel like one giant fuck up - it's not a reason to get depressed over, but "its actually the motivation". So thats what that little voice inside my head is doing! All along I thought there was a wounded inner child that incessantly cried for attention. You mean the little voice is actually my inner cheer leader? Whooda Thunk?

Its refreshing really.

Meanwhile, back in the land of my Darwinian enigmas..I am watching an impressive display of dawdling and procrastination. I offered food treats if the boys picked up their toys. So far they have managed to cycle their efforts at least three times....pick up toys - take out toys -- play --watch DVD --demand treats ---remember to pick up -- and so on. For those who wonder about the value of my Pavlovian approach obviously have no children and really cannot comprehend the complexities involved in motivating two little boys to clean up after themselves. In such matters one uses whatever works. I am fully human. Here I sit in my messy livingroom...waiting for the pope to die (well I am...and I didnt say hoping)...and I think...

What the hell am I thinking?

Food treats before bed?

Oi...there is much motivation...scads and piles and reams and acres and furlongs and fathoms of it