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As promised, here are some photos of the new decorations around the house this year.
The tree is always the last to go in and we’re going to get it this weekend. We’re going to try to put it in front of the living room window this year. Stay tuned.
Last Friday it occurred to me that we have lived in our house for three years and I have never taken a bath in our bathtub. In fact, once I started thinking about it, I realized that I had not taken a bath since my wedding when we were lucky enough to have the honeymoon suite which included a whirpool tub.
I like baths. I used to take them a lot more often, but I think I can pinpoint the moment I stopped making them a regular part of my routine: when I moved out of my parents house. I mean honestly, who takes baths in college? There were no tubs in the dorms and the tub in our rented house senior year just didn’t seem clean enough. Then I moved to grad school and had a nice apartment with a nice big tub, but still no baths. No baths while living with the four boys (four boys is explanation enough) and our first apartment in Indy had a teeny tiny tub. Now we’re in our house with a decent sized bathroom and tub and I decided the time had come to take that bath.
Things you need for a successful bath:
1. Hot water
2. Bath salts, bubble bath or body wash
3. Magazines
4. Wine
5. Candles
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| Wine & candles. |
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| Bubbles! |
Friday night (I know, my life is wild and crazy) I had all these items and more importantly, I had the time, so off I went to draw a bath. It was nice. I think I’ll be taking a lot more.
My sister, Ashley, who many of you know and love from her personal blog HiFi Hilarity, has started a new food blog, The Apathetic Herbivore.
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| The blogger in action. She doesn’t mess around. |
You should read it. That is all.
Once again the holiday season is upon us (let’s not dwell on the fact that this is my first post in several months) and today I took on the task of decorating our house. I enjoy decorating for Christmas. I find it fun and it usually puts my in the spirit, but it does come with a few frustrations:
1. Lights. Out of the six strands of white lights that I use for Christmas decorating (garlands, wreaths, trees, etc) only two strands lit up when plugged in. To say that I found this annoying would be an understatement.
2. Artificial garland. It’s scratchy. It’s dusty. It makes my hands and forearms look like I’ve gone four rounds with a food processor. I like the way it looks when it’s up and I’m sure it is much easier to wrangle then real garland but still…
3. Missing decorations. I like to think I’m fairly organized person, but I do misplace things which was evident today when I tore my house apart looking for a decoration that I was certain was in a rubbermaid tub. It was in fact in a plastic bag at the bottom of my stairs. Yeah…
4. Materials. I was pretty sure that this year I would not need any new decorations or replacements. Clearly I did not anticipate the light fiasco, so I will be venturing back out to Target tomorrow for a few items.
5. Placement. We don’t have a large house, which is good because I have a hard enough time remembering where I put everything the year before. I try to take photographs, but sometimes you have to shake things up.
Photos will make an appearance when I’m done with the decorating, which should happen by tomorrow night as long as there isn’t another “lighting incident.” Ahem.
In other news, we attended our first holiday party of the season last night. It was hosted by our friends, the Nicols, and it was beautiful and festive. I bought a new dress for the occasion:
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| Doing my part in cheetah print. You’re damn right. |
Man, I love the holidays.
This semester I am teaching a World Lit class for our burgeoning Honors Program. It’s a new experience for me and it’s proving to be very enjoyable. I am familiar with much of the reading, but I still spent the end of the spring semester and the entire summer prepping the course. My class is small (seven students) but they have proven to be an enthusiastic and dynamic group, which is great for discussion.
This week (the class meets once a week for three hours) we read and discussed Medea, so I spent much of last week/end re-reading the play and preparing for discussion. If you’re not familiar with the play by the Greek playwright Euripedes, you should read it. It is my favorite of the Greek plays and I prefer it over Oedipus Rex and Antigone.
While re-reading Medea, I started thinking about connections/references that a modern day audience could make to the play. This is something that I always think about when teaching literature to students who are not familiar with the work already. Currently, my class is split almost in half in terms of students who have at least heard about some of this reading and students who thought I was talking about Tyler Perry when I assigned Medea. No matter what the level of familiarity is with the reading, the students still need an entry point to the story. They need to find a reason to connect to the plot and the characters because once that connection is made, then they can begin to discuss why the piece is relevant to a modern day audience. In other words, they can begin to answer the age old question: “Why are we still reading this stuff?”
*While I was reading Medea and thinking about modern connections, I happened to come across a story about Chris Brown on Facebook. As most of you know, Chris Brown is a popular pop singer who made headlines for a physical altercation with then girlfriend, pop superstar Rhianna. Her bruised and beaten face made all the news outlets and many radio stations temporarily banned his music from the airwaves. The story has raised it’s head several times in the past year, partly due to celebrity involvement in helping Rhianna and Chris “reconcile,” her decision to publicly forgive him and most recently, because of the tattoo that Chris Brown has on his neck. I’m not particularly interested in whether or not the tattoo depicted on his neck is a battered woman, a zombie or Osiris (all speculation on the internet). My opinion of Chris Brown wasn’t good even before his altercation with Rhianna, so that’s a closed case in my mind. However, Rhianna’s public response to the incident and in turn, the impact it has on young women and how they view physical abuse is something I care about.
How does this relate to Medea? When Jason (Medea’s husband and hero of golden fleece fame) decides to leave his wife for the younger, more powerful Corinthian princess, Medea’s rage knows no bounds. She is what the phrase “hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” epitomizes. In the end her rage and desire for vengeance leads not only to her murder of the princess and her father, King Creon of Corinth, but also the murder of her two young sons. She was a powerful woman, a queen, and the daughter of the sun god, Apollo. To say that she was not a woman to cross, is an understatement.
Clearly, I am not advocating murder as revenge and the tale penned by Euripedes was meant to scandalize and tantalize Greek audiences. However, the play Medea is also about power and control and when Jason tried to take that power and control, the consequences were devastating. In the case of Chris Brown and Rhianna, where is the rage? Where is the power? Who has the control? It seems to fall with the same individual. His rage. His power. His control.
A final thought, in the introduction to Medea, the textbook makes this observation:
For the Greeks, a hero was not necessarily a good, kind person, but rather a strong, larger than life figure whose deeds were somehow performed on a grand scale (The Bedford Anthology of World Literature, 1003).
At the conclusion of the play, Medea flies off in a chariot pulled by dragons, leaving Jason in misery. Many Greeks could have considered her hero. Can we say the same of Rhianna?
* A few disclaimers: 1). I understand Chris Brown and Rhianna are public figures, so I am basing my thoughts on the information I have as a public consumer. 2). I am in no way, shape or form blaming Rhianna for what happened to her. 3). This is what happens when a bunch of different thoughts converge in my head. At the end of the day, it’s just my opinion.
The fall semester started at my community college August 21st and so far it’s been a solid three weeks. A fellow colleague mentioned that there “seemed to be something different in the air this semester” and it got me thinking about some of the things I’ve observed over the past few weeks.
1. The enthusiasm for extracurricular activities on campus is increasing. This may seem like an odd observation given that I work at a college, but our students are all commuters, so sometimes drawing them towards student organizations and community service events can be tricky. They are pulled between work, family and classes, so when we had our annual activities fair the second week of school it was a pleasant surprise to see lots of new and returning students signing up for email lists and asking questions about how to get involved.
2. Our campus feels more like a campus. When I began teaching at my community college, the campus consisted of two buildings at our downtown location. This past spring we moved into a brand new academic building that houses offices, student lounges, classrooms, a food court and a coffee bar. We recently finished construction on our new culinary building and we now have a skywalk that joins two of the busiest buildings on campus. I love walking into my building in the morning and seeing students line up to buy coffee.
3. Students seem more organized and better prepared for classes. Of course there are always exceptions to the rule, but I think our increased attention to new student orientation has helped in terms of teaching students how to be students. A lot of our students are non-traditional, so assimilating back into a college environment presents a whole other set of challenges.
I’m embarking on some new projects this semester as well and I’m reminded of how much I like the energy and excitement that comes with a new semester. Here’s hoping that energy continues.
This morning a brief glimpse of fall arrived when I opened my eyes. It was dark and it was raining. Pouring rain that echoed off the roof and rushed out of our gutters. I’ve never minded rainy days. I find them relaxing and they bring a welcome excuse to stay inside and read or write or watch a favorite movie (my personal three favorite films for rainy days: Murder on the Orient Express, The Shawshank Redemption and Gosford Park). I also have no fear of thunderstorms. I love to watch them from my front porch and there is nothing more soothing than going to sleep to the sound of a summer storm.
All that being said, I like rain but this morning when I woke up, I heard the rain and I felt relief. It’s been a dry summer, as in Indiana is suffering from one of the worst droughts on record. The corn is lying dead in the fields, hay is absurdly expensive, farmers markets are missing melons and berries and tomatoes and lawns are all various shades of brown. In the last week or so residents of Indiana have seen some relief in scattered showers here and there but this morning came the first real, soaking rain that we’ve seen in months.
On my way to work, I had to turn on my windshield wipers and swerve around growing lakes of water from blocked storm drains. Indiana is flat, so when it rains, the water pools into mini lakes all around town. As a testament to how dry it has been this summer, in the past when we did get a little rain, there were no small lakes or even a puddle to speak of. The ground just sucked the water right up and looked for more.
It’s too late to salvage much of what the drought has taken from farmers and residents of Indiana this summer, but I hope for a wet, soggy fall that will lead to snowy winter to replenish the water table and bring green lawns and full gardens next spring.
All of a sudden it is August 9th and summer is coming to end. Labor Day is right around the corner, the fall semester starts August 20th and the kids have already gone back to school. This summer has been a strange one, so I give you a list of highs and lows (in no particular order):
Highs:
1. 2012 Summer Olympics. I love the Olympics. I love handball, water polo, weight lifting, beach volleyball and on and on and on. I especially love the equestrian events. Thanks to DVR, I recorded all the 3 Day eventing, Dressage and show jumping. It’s awesome and I am happy.
2. Indiana State Fair. There’s nothing like a giant lemon flavored milkshake and barns full of livestock to make a girl smile. It’s the year of the dairy cow at the fair this year, and that also makes me smile.
3. Summer trips. We’ve been to Murray, KY, Louisville, KY, Erie, PA and Pittsburgh, PA this summer. We’ve attended weddings, family reunions, alumni panels and horse races. It’s been a good time.
4. Outdoor concerts. I love sitting outside in a fold out chair and listening to live music. It’s one of my favorite summer activities.
5. The pool. I really love our outdoor pool at the local Y. It’s killer.
Lows:
1. Heat. It has been a record high for temperatures this summer in Indiana. In June and July we had 100 degree temps several days in a row. When it’s hot like this, the only thing you can do is stay inside and hope it cools off.
2. Drought. My garden is crisp, my lawn looks like burnt toast and this is the first year on record that our CSA has skipped a week because they don’t have enough produce. Hay is $10 a bale and the corn crop is decimated. I’m over it.
3. Water ban. Because we’re are in a severe drought, we can’t water. This leads to my garden going from crispy to downright dead. Sigh.
5. Burn ban. We have a new grill and a new fire pit. How many times have we used them this summer? Once and that was back in May.
Note: As I type this post, it is overcast and raining. I think it’s been raining all night. Keep your fingers crossed…
One of my goals this summer was to read more books and I think so far I’ve been doing pretty well. In the past two weeks I’ve read two books, Swamplandia! & Wild. I actually finished Swamplandia! first, but I’ve been mulling it over for about a week.
Swamplandia! is by Karen Russell and I found the book on The New York Time’s Best Seller List. I usually go to this list when I’m looking for good books, because to be honest, it rarely fails me. You can talk all you want about pretension and liberals and all that noise, but the people at The NY Times can pick books. I chose Swamplandia! from the list for a couple of reasons:
1. It has a killer title, right?
2. It was a story about a family and that family contained two sisters.
3. There was an alligator on the cover.
I realize that the last admission might make me sound trite. I’m an English Professor. I know. I’m supposed to pick books based on their literary merit, good reviews and lyrical prose. Yeah, yeah. Well, this time I picked a book based on a cool title and kick ass cover and you know what? I was not disappointed.
Swamplandia! is the story of the Bigtree family told from the point of view of Ava Bigtree, the youngest member of the family. At the opening of the novel, we learn that the Bigtree family runs a gator park in the Florida Everglades called Swamplandia! We also learn that the family matriarch and star of the show, Hilola Bigtree, has died of cancer leaving her husband Chief, oldest son Kiwi, daughter Osceola and Ava to fend for themselves. What follows is winding narrative of a family splitting apart and coming back together.
The characters in this novel are complicated and fascinating. Ava’s desire to take her mother’s place and save the bankrupt Swamplandia! is the storyline that comes to the forefront, but what we come to find out is that Ava isn’t trying to save the park. She’s trying to save her family.
The details in this novel are rich and fantastical, but they’re also believable. Kiwi, disgusted with his father’s refusal to accept the family’s dire financial situation, leaves home and gets a job at “The World of Darkness” a competing tourist attraction. Osceola becomes obsessed with ghosts and the occult and eventually gets herself involved romantically with a dead sailor named Louis. Yes, he’s dead. Ava puts all her hope in a mutant baby gator and the Chief simply disappears on a “business trip” to the mainland.
This brings me to what I liked best about this book, the thin line between fantasy and reality that all of the characters walk. There is Kiwi’s fantasy that he will save enough money working at “The World of Darkness” to save Swamplandia! There is Osceloa’s fantasy that she will find love in the arms of a ghost. There is the Chief’s fantasy that he can save his family and his business by disappearing to the mainland for a summer and working in a casino and finally, there is Ava’s fantasy that she will save Swamplandia! and become a famous gator wrestler like her mother.
The reality? It’s a lot uglier but it is tinged with the love and hope that all the characters have. I wasn’t sure how I felt about the final chapters of the book (I won’t give them away here) but I’ve decided that the ending works well. This was the classic tale of a journey and what is true about all journeys is that sooner or later, they have to end.
Wild by Cheryl Strayed is also a story about a journey and while I didn’t do this on purpose, there are definitely some overlapping themes in both Swamplandia! and Wild.
Wild is nonfiction book covering the author’s trek across the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT). For those of you who don’t anything about the PCT (which I didn’t before I started reading this book) this is no walk in the park. Strayed (the story of her last name is covered in the book) started her hike in Mojave, CA and ended it at The Bridge of Gods in Oregon. This is the map that Strayed included in the opening of the book.
Coincidentally, this story also begins with the loss of Strayed’s mother, Bobbi, to lung cancer. Admittedly, there were points in this book where I felt like there was not one more sad, unfortunate or self-destructive thing that could happen to this woman (and this was before she started her hike on the PCT) and I’m sure some people would find this a burden. However, if you read previous posts from me concerning memoir and nonfiction, you know that I love stories about people rising above adversity and I’m not turned off my hardship, no matter how terrible the author suffers. This book made me cry, it made me sigh, and it made me laugh. It is essentially a journey through grief and if you’ve ever grieved deeply, you’ll feel a certain kinship with Strayed. You will also feel admiration.
I picked up Wild because I heard the second half of an interview with Strayed on NPR and I was intrigued. I came into the interview when she was reading the prologue of the book, which begins like this:
The trees were tall, but I was taller standing above them on a steep mountain slope in northern California. Moments before, I’d removed my hiking boots and the left one had fallen in those trees, first catapulting into the air when my enormous backpack toppled into it, then skittering across the gravelly trail and flying over the edge. 
My first thought was (because I had missed half the interview) how the hell did she hike with one boot? Then I heard her continue:
I clutched its mate to my chest like a baby, though of course it was futile. What is one boot without the other boot? It is nothing. Useless, an orphan forevermore, and I could take no mercy on it. It was a big lug of a thing, of genuine theft, a brown leather Raichle boot with a red lace and silver fasts. I lifted it high and threw it with all my might and watched it fall into the lush trees and out of my life.
My second thought: She did what?
I knew I had to read the book. You should read it too.
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| Weighted hook. |
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| Tiny telephone pencil sharpener. |
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| Beautiful piece of Wedgewood. It was $12.50 because of a teeny tiny little chip on the rim. Good deal! |
The first two items I found at a new store in Irvington called Irvington Vintage. They are located at 130 S. Audubon Rd and they have a wide variety of items for sale. The Wedgewood piece I found at The Audubon Road Corner Store. Both places are worth checking out if you are looking for unique gifts or something different for your own home. They are also right across the street from one another.
The final photos are two of the first zinnias of the summer. I planted the seeds a few weeks ago and when I went out this morning, there they were.
Brianna Pike 