Open Wide and say "Aaaaahhh"

I love that snow precipitates not loudly but in quiet whispers.  If it weren't for the occasional overnight wind batting flakes against the window, there'd be nothing to tell my sleeping self that, just outside, the world is being transformed. Beautifully so.

Already, a Sunday morning is my favorite part of the week, filled with not much at all, except Finn and a fat newspaper, crosswords and a nice walk, with a little NPR as background music.  Add the surprise of snow and I wonder if a heart can burst from contentment.

By 6:30, Finn's sideward glances have had their desired effect and I begin lacing up my boots, even though I know his near-naked paws too soon will call "uncle" against the backdrop of unshoveled sidewalks.  Sure enough, five houses from ours, he looks up at me, ashamed that he cannot walk any further.  I bend down, swoop him into my arms and cradle his icy front paws as I turn back towards home.

My paws, however, are still toasty.  And so, I drop Finn at home and head back outside, drawn by the quiet tabula rasa of untouched paths.  I walk for quite awhile, into the neighborhood and through the park,  warmed by the peace of it all.

This, this is what I see in my future--my feet on the ground and my head in the clouds, unfettered by deadlines or meetings.  A hundred Sunday mornings laid out in front of me,  my boots wet and scuffed and my heart filled to bursting.

Second and six

This photo, which I took on the last official morning of my last official summer, speaks to me today.  I love the softness of the fog, the sun-and-cloud sky, the unpaved road fading into the trees.  It was a happy morning for me, tucked between rolling Sandhills and the wild Niobrara. The deep peace of that weekend put me in a good place as I headed into the meeting-heavy start of this, my last school year.

Today, three months later, this photo acts as a telescope for me, a peek into the beyond that might be.    Its promise settles me, especially when I find myself wondering about my decision to retire. 

I am convinced that it's good to leave while my love is intact, but it is that very love that makes the leaving more difficult.  Especially when I'm nuts about so many Spartans.

. . . so, basically, I'm setting myself up to be heartbroken, come late May.

Most of the time, though, this impending heartache is tinged with something else--the strange pull of "what ifs" and "why nots"--and I am left slightly giddy, wondering how I will write this next chapter.

It is, I believe, a chapter that has been waiting for me.  I started to feel its as-yet-unnamed tug two years ago, when death and illness and Donald Trump came onto the scene.  Thinking back, I've come to believe that it's possible that a month of radiation literally left me filled with light.  How else to explain this transformation that fills me molecularly, intellectually, emotionally?

I am a different person today than I was two years ago.  Physically softer, yet stronger, too.  Less tolerant of BS.  More likely to question authority 

But I also am more willing to love ridiculously, with great joy and abandon, even if it means my heart will ultimately break into a million different pieces. 

These are my prism years, after all, everything beautiful and complicated refracting the light that fills me, and I can't quit staring at the wonder of it all.

Once Upon a One-House-For-All

Once upon a time, there was a big, bricky house filled with all kinds of characters.  Over 2,200 of them, in fact.  Tall ones.  Short ones.  Some loud, others quiet.  They were good to look at from a distance, a lovely mix of blacks and browns, white sand and sunshine.

The variety did not stop there. Rich, poor.  Christian, Jew.  Trans and straight. Even Democrat and Republican could be seen, bumped up together in orderly rows.  Some were whip smart while others took their time figuring things out.  Which was just fine, thankyouverymuch.

On any given day, this motley crew was funny and sad and complicated--often, all at once.  They worked hard and often failed, but, sometimes everything lined up just right, which felt pretty great.  And--my God!--in those bright moments, they were something to see!

For the most part, they got along.

Sure, there were the crude cat calls, the microbursts of violence exploding in a flurry of fists.  And, on just about any day, you'd find one or two of them huddled in a bathroom stall, tears rolling down a cheek.  But always--always--there'd be someone else reaching out, building a bridge, waiting behind as the laggard caught up.  Just to be sure.

In this once-upon-an-every-single-school-day place, people knew that they may not always agree with each other, but they also were certain that they would find a way to work together, when needed.  Sure, it was messy and even a little scary to reach out to the "other," but that seldom stopped them from standing up when it was the right thing to do and extending a hand when one was needed.

And, because this is a fable, I dare say that even the adults found a way to get past their differences.  Woven into the rich fabric of this house's lore are fanciful tales of MAGA fans, Bernie supporters, NRA members and Sierra Club volunteers drinking beer together! Perhaps it was the hops that bound them.  More likely, though, it was their commitment to the young ones that helped them look beyond yard signs and tweets.

Whilst I know that it needs no saying, I shall say it anyway:  This was no place for a Cyclopian politician, who drew lines not in the sand but, rather, with a knobby stick dragged furiously through wet cement.  Although even he would occasionally be invited in, to blow hot air into the auditorium, his fetid breath clinging to the backs of bored teens, whose heads slumped into their laps, where tiny devices blinked and glowed furiously back at them.  Even he might find himself changed staring into a crowd of all those others.

No, this was no place for partisan tomfoolery, though parts and wholes were discussed daily in science and math classes.  Here, within the  rough-hewn walls that rebuffed the relentless, endlessly changing winds,  folks got down to the real business of life--learning how to live it, shoulder to shoulder, arms linked and eyes wide open.

A River Runs Through It

Isn't this photo amazing?  I saw some version of it on Facebook recently and couldn't get it out of my mind.  Captioned as the place where the Atlantic and Pacific meet, I brought the concept to the lunch table, where all things frivolous and fantastic are discussed.  There, its legitimacy was confirmed, and so I believed it.

. . . until this morning, when I did a bit more research on Snopes.

While the photo is legitimate, Snopes identified the accompanying text as misleading.  Turns out, this image is of sediment-heavy glacial-river water being carried by ocean currents near the Gulf of Alaska.  One of the first photographers of this phenomenon, ocean sciences professor Ken Bruland, also debunked the idea that this delineation is impermeable.

"They do eventually mix, but you come across these really strong gradients at these specific moments in time."

When I read his quote, I had to remind myself that he was talking about water, not our country.  And yet, his explanation easily could be applied to the United States at this specific moment in time, don't you think?

Consider my original source of confirmation--the lunch-table crowd, which is made up of a smart bunch of folks.  When they told me it was true, I assumed that it was.

But it wasn't.  Not exactly.   It's a good reminder that I need to leave my tribe sometimes and venture out for additional sources. 


His quote packed another punch for me, as well.  A hopeful one.

"They do eventually mix, . . . "

In a time when politicians and news agencies seem only to focus on the bookends--the weirdos on both sides--it's good to be reminded that, in many ways, we are still mixing it up with each other in that messy middle, where most of us reside.

Bruland also offered hope when explaining the line between things.  "Such borders are never static, as they move around and disappear altogether, depending on the level of the sediment and the whims of the water."

Regardless of what we are told each day, we are less either/or than we are both/and.  Maybe it's time to clear the sediment and resist the whims a bit.

Buckle Up, Boys

Move over, Katniss Everdeen!  There's a pudgy, "middle"-aged white woman from the heartland who's had enough, and she's not gonna to take it anymore.

Granted, I can't shoot a bow without some bruising, and I prefer protests that wrap up by late afternoon,  so that I can get back home in time to make dinner.

But, still.

Still, I've given birth--twice!  And had cancer, to boot.  Plus, there's a limited-edition badass beer with my face on the label.

Oh, and I also have developed a super power in the past few years--invisibility. Which means you don't even see me anymore.  And, while that can kind of suck at times, there are advantages to your limited vision of me.

So, yeah.   Ignore me at your peril.

Actually, ignore us at your peril, you puffy, privileged white boys in Washington.   You have seen nothing like the patience of a pissed off woman.

And, by the way,  there are five million more of us than there are of you.   Not to mention all of the good guys out there who stand with us, because they know a good thing when they see one.

Some folks have wondered why I'm retiring when I still love my job.  In part, it's so that I can join the fight without fear of consequences.  And I'm thinking there will be consequences . . . .

"For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction." --Isaac Newton

Play Misty for Me

I walked in a Gaussian blur this morning, glasses tucked inside my pocket.  It's an interesting exercise, to view the world through imperfect vision. . . . although it could be argued that there is no other way to see things than imperfectly.

I found this softened view at once disorienting and quieting.  Neighbor and dog, now smeared along the edges, became "probably Jan and Kira" rather than the certainties they usually are.  And the mist, which, yesterday, got in the way of things as it built up on my lenses, had a completely different effect today.  No longer a deterrent,  it became something I could just enjoy, as it found and held me, its cool fingers whispering "hello."

Halfway through my walk, my eyes adjusting to their new view, I found myself looking for the larger lesson, one I could apply to all the stifling ugliness outside of me.   No clouds parted.  No booming voice rattled me from my thoughts.  But I did see something--namely a large, dark mass huddled under a pine up ahead.  My mind went where my eyes couldn't yet take me, from a curious fox to a slumbering man.  It wasn't until I was nearly upon it that I realized it was a flattened cardboard box.

The lesson?  I need to shed my preconceptions and get close enough to see what something--or someone--really is.

There is something to be said for tossing aside a pair of glasses that guarantees only one kind of seeing.

This is the Place Where the Earth Was Breathing

Saturday.  5:17 a.m.

Mark is downstairs, eating a bowl of Cheerios before going to work.  I know this because this is what he does every work-day morning at this time.

It's not him I'm hearing, though.  No, I am roused by something else.  Something lower.  A rhythmic, older sound just outside my window.

I shuffle the sheets and turn towards the window, straining to hear it.   Too airy for a screech owl.  Too quiet for sirens.  It continues, even after Mark pulls the car out of the drive.

Eventually, I get out of bed and crouch near the opened window, waiting intently.  And that's when it strikes me.

Breath.  What I'm hearing is breathing.

The realization confounds me, so I grab a pair of shorts and head outside to look into things.  Finn joins me, his ears standing at alert, which offers me little comfort.

Bare feet on cool patio, I turn my eyes upward, taking in the last quiet moments of a night sky, tracing my fingers along Casseopeia's letter-like edges.  I know this is nothing more than a delay tactic, but I stand there just the same.

I feel unsettled by the task.

As I walk down the drive,  two competing thoughts name the source of the sound and I wonder what I'll find when I reach the space between two houses--a slumbering man or . . . nothing at all.  It is this second prediction that makes me think I'm not fully awake just yet.

I mean, how on earth could the earth actually be breathing?! 

Sure enough, there is no man laying crumpled upon the dewy, uncut grass.  Just the grass and the shrubs and the fence line, wrapped up in cricket song and earthy exhalations.  I stand in wonder, half expecting to see the ground lurch upward.

Eventually, I head inside, for raspberry preserves on English muffin, before going to the park, where a bushful of monarchs flits from flower to flower, as though it were just another day ending in 'y.'

Four Little Birds . . . .

I'm nuts about birds.  Always have been.  And what's not to love about them? 

I mean, they live outdoors.  They sing.  They fly.  And they don't need to buy outfits from Younkers, which just closed, because they are naturally beautiful. 

But, like everything that we love, there comes a time when they break our hearts just a wee.

This is a photo of a Baltimore Oriole (one of my favorite birds) that I saw last spring.  I was on a walk with school friends and the Oriole was in a mid-flight fight with a pesky Grackle.  Seconds later, the two feuding birds swooped low, in front of a car, and the Oriole hit the bumper.  I rushed into the street and nudged the Oriole towards the curb, where it died a few seconds later.  I took a photo of it--lovely and quiet and internally broken--as a kind of witness, I suppose.

We continued our walk and I pretended to be okay, although my mind and heart remained with that lovely, lovely bird, now growing cold on the street behind us.  I hated to think of it deteriorating, alone, on the asphalt, imagining a nestful of babies waiting for their mama.

. . . I'm a lousy faker.

Last weekend, Mark--who encounters creatures of epic proportion out there, where airplanes take off and land--brought home a hummingbird that had died in a hangar. 

My goodness, but she was beautiful.  That luminous coat.  Her tiny feet tucked under her soft, white belly.  And that thread-like tongue, protruding from her beak . . . .

I've been witness to two other lovely, post-mortem birds--an olive-green Ovenbird resting quietly by our sandbox on C Street and a perfect Cedar Waxwing laying on a sidewalk along M Street.

Each of these four birds gave me the chance to lean in and look closely.  In their deaths, I learned more about their lives. 

Holding the Hummingbird, I was taken aback when I parted its breast feathers and saw those tiny, tiny feet.  Leaning over the Oriole, I was mesmerized by the way the colors alternated on its wings.  Gape-jawed and ignorant, I had to hit the books to name that lovely Ovenbird, the only one I've ever seen.  And I don't think I'll ever forget finding the lovely yellow band that ran along the Cedar Waxwing's tail feathers.

I was looking through my address book the other day and found a page filled with bird names.  I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that, next to the list of my human neighbors' names was a list of the birds I've met in my neighborhood since moving here in 2004. 

Both humans and birds have made this a very lovely place to live.

Mean Girl With Crazy Overbite

Finn, who is not Tessa.

I admit it.  I hate Tessa.

I hate her stupid haircut.  Her dumb dirty-blonde hair.  Her tinny, awful voice.

In fact, I hate her so much that, in all these years of living near her,  I've never even bothered to find out what her stupid name is, until this morning, when I was forced to learn it.

"TESSA!  STOP it!  Or I'll bring out the water.  I mean it!  Okay.  I'm getting the water. . . "

Again--the damned water that never appears.  And, again,  I am left calming myself, cursing that stupid purse dog and her tiresome "owner, " as though any human has any chance at all of owning Tessa.

It's like a scene from "Groundhog's Day."

Every morning, tucked into the corner of her Tom Sawyer picket fence, Tessa lays in wait, giddy with dreams of gaslighting Finn and me.  It's as if she can sense that, by the time we reach her yard, I'm finally peaceful, having just forgotten who our president is. 

If Tessa were an 8th grader, I'd call her a mean girl.  She's Scott Farkus, with an ugly overbite.  And her owner is that desperate stoolie by her side, always threatening to act, but never quite following through.

To be fair, Tessa didn't get this way on her own.  She's the product of years of reactionary, waterless threats, not a backbone within miles of her.  And therein lies the rub for me.

Tessa, it turns out, is the perfect product of her upbringing.  Which makes my thoughts turn to baseball . . . .

Baseball might be America's favorite pastime but it makes a lousy repository of parenting tips.  If we've laid the foundation at all, three strikes are two strikes too many.   Empty threats eventually are exposed for what they really are--veiled permission to repeat the infraction.  And even a dumb dog is smart enough to take advantage of that kind of loophole.

As a dog lover, I'm ashamed of how much I hate Tessa.  But maybe my gripe isn't with her after all.  Maybe it's with the robed woman underneath the porch light, who always shows up 30 seconds too late, uttering nonsensical sounds falling on deaf doggy ears.

Maybe she's the one who needs a time out.

Dissing My Mission

Why is it that so many people are so quick to ask why anyone would want to work in a school?  And--equally baffling--they often say it like it's some weird,  backwards way of supporting us and what we do.

Do you think that, had I become a lawyer or an accountant or a dental receptionist, I would have donned belly-dancing garb with my work pals to shake my booty on some steamy summer evening?  Yeah, no. 

I'm pretty sure that at least half of the dumb, joyful stuff I've done in the past 30 years is because of my school pals.

Maybe--just maybe--those of us who have chosen education as our career path aren't as lost or as desperate or as misguided as everyone else thinks.  Most of us really like the young 'uns.  The chaos.  All that potential, wrapped up in hope, just out of reach.

And, as fun as my colleagues are (and--oh, my--are they a fun bunch), it really is the kids who draw me back to the building each Monday.  Even the annoying ones.  Maybe them especially.

Let me be clear.

Tests be damned.

We adults who show up at school every morning--in the office, in the classroom, in the halls, in the cafeteria--we know what really matters--the relationships we forge with those young folks.  The chance we have, each day, to really see them.  To count them among the counted.  To love them, even when they wonder how anyone could possibly love the messes that they are. 

. . . granted, sometimes it helps when we ourselves are messes.

So, to all of you who can't imagine what it is that would draw anyone into the schools for a living. . . I do believe you are trying to be supportive.  But your support would be more welcomed in a vote for what we do, in a nod to the value of young people, in a donated sackful of clothes you no longer need that might help a young person feel good at school this year.  Minus the beaded bra and thumb cymbals, perhaps.

Ode to Joys

Even though I was nearly 500 miles away when this little beaut grew its wings, I felt deep joy at its introduction to this wild, weird world.  Of course, the mother in me would like to point out that the reason I was able to experience this joy was because my kids--decent beyond decency, good beyond good--filmed its wet-winged release so that I could experience it.

I cannot imagine a world without joy.  Especially right now.

What if it turned out that the best thing we could do in the face of so much ugliness and hatred was to simply enjoy something when the opportunity presented itself? To refuse to let that  moment of joy be taken from us?

It strikes me as wonderfully radical, this notion that joy, like breakfast, should never be skipped, lest the world come unraveling before our very eyes.

Last week,  I read an article about U.N. Ambassador Nicky Haley telling a group of conservative teen leaders that "owning the libs" (a term new to me, although it also hit close to home) was nothing a true leader would pursue. After reading it,  I realized that maybe I'd been played all these months.  And, yet, I also saw a sliver of hope in her message to these young leaders.

So I devised a plan in response to all that owning.

But it turns out that my new approach to this crazy life is actually my old approach to it--to never turn down an opportunity to embrace joy, to stand gape jawed in the presence of a newborn monarch butterfly, its wings still wet, its mind wondering where all the good milkweed is.

Joy, I believe, just might hold the key to something better.

In fact, I know it does.  . . . a better me, to begin with.

Now, Juxt a Minute!

I love this photo my neighbor Gary took--the beer in the foreground, the nuns and Calvin and Allie and soon-to-be Theo in the background.  I love it because of its juxtaposition--things that a person might not normally fit within a single frame.  And yet, here they are, tucked in together.  No wide-angle lens necessary.

As an ex-Catholic living on a very papal street, the fencewalker in me feels fine enjoying my nun neighbors and my now-UCC religious roots.  Certain that I can happily have both, just because.

I can't decide if my love of odd bedfellows and my tendency towards fencewalking are reasons or excuses for me.  Do they inspire my actions or explain away my inaction?  Chances are, the answer falls somewhere in between.

And yet, I have a handful of beliefs that are anchored in certitude.  For instance, I fervently believe that the only way we will get through these dark times is if we walk out together--nuns and ex-Catholics, believers and deniers, Democrats and Republicans, white and black and everything in between.  Odd bedfellows make powerful communities.

That said, you'll understand if the thought makes my stomach a little queasy . . . .

I mean, I wasn't the greatest Catholic and am hardly anything to brag about at work or at home or sitting in the back pew with a handful of other religious orphans, quietly composing my grocery list.

But I'd like to think that I'm willing to show up and give things a whirl.

Considering all of this, then, I'd say that odd bedfellows generally inspire me to act, even in the midst of my discomfort.  And that is a good thing.

As for my well-developed fence-walking tendencies?  Yeah, I'm pretty sure I lean into these when I don't want to lean into anything else too terribly far.  Or when I want to kind of fake it.

When I was what my friend Matt and I referred to as a "bastard lovechild " in the English Department (what else to call someone who only taught journalism and pop culture?!), I'd use my fence-walking skills to try to fit in.   Hungry to be mistaken as an intellectual (a highly-prized label in a literature-soaked environment), I'd feign excitement about polysyllabic words, philosophically-driven mission statements and heady discussions about the "why" of things, despite being a who-what-when-where kind of person.   Soon enough, though, the jig would be up, when a true scholar would ask me to look over her rough draft and I'd find myself drowning in commas and compound sentences, not knowing how or where to even begin.

Alas, it turns out you can't teach an old Strunk-and-Whiter Faulknerian tricks.

Still,  I  appreciate the different ways all of my English bedfellows teach and speak, despite my continual return to the comfort of a 20-word paragraph.

How can I explain this love of diversity living next door to a tendency towards the non-committal?  Look in the mirror and tell me yourself.

We are all much messier than the shiny slivers of selves that we portray on social media.  We are hypocrites and hypochondriacs, yet also capable of being deeply moved in the presence of beauty.  Maybe--just maybe--our truest selves are found at the antipode of purity--living at that furthest point from the clearest thing, muddied and relieved, and certainly not so easy to understand.  Juxtaposed from within.

You know.  Beautiful, in a sloppy sort of way.

The Real Birther Movement

I'm no bra burner.  But I also don't do the laundry.  Mark does.  And that's only because I once almost started a fire after putting our children's wet,  down-filled winter coats in the dryer, so this division of labor is as it should be.

It's important to know what's in your wheelhouse and what isn't.  So, what's in my wheelhouse these days?  Really, the question should be who is in my wheelhouse.

Women, that's who.

And it turns out there are lots and lots of women in the United States right now.  Just four years ago, in fact, there were 5 million more women than men living in the U.S.  On college campuses,  56 percent of students are women, as are nearly 58 percent of college grads. And, if you happen to live to 85?  Women outnumber men nearly 2 to 1 in that demographic.

My point?

Sweet God, men!  Start behaving.  Like, two years ago!!  And, frankly,  why are you still running the show in Washington?

True, we may make less money than you, but we will always make more children and milk than you.  And there's a reason that women, not men, give birth.  Survival of the species comes to mind.

Don't get me wrong.  I'm nuts about men.  Some of my favorite people are men.

But it'd be stupid to put them in charge solely because of body parts.

So I just would like to remind you men out there (and let's be honest--white men, mostly.  Plus, Ben Carson) that there are more of us than you.  And we are strong and capable and have endurance like nobody's business.  But, really?

Kids in cages?

Girls for sale?

Eighty one cents to each dollar of yours?

I may be cute, but I'm not stupid.

Roots Run Deep

This morning, I woke with a hankering to return to my childhood home on Sumner Street, to see if my beloved Pussy Willow was still holding its ground on the southwest corner of our house.  It was an amazing tree, producing immense pussy willows (called 'catkins,' I learned this morning--how great is that?!) that I was certain were Guinness-worthy.

Earlier this week, Mark and I drove down the narrow alley next to our C Street house, gape-jawed by the sight of the Bradford Pear we'd planted, whose crown now competes with the peak of the roof.

For me, it's trees, as much as the structures themselves, that beckon me back to the places where I once lived. 

Trees are like lifelong friends for me, shining a warm light on old memories while also acknowledging the unmistakable march of time, skin cracked and stretched, limbs bent and aching.

They are the both/and for me--longing and hope all in one.

The photo above is of a beauty that lives in my neighbor Lisa's yard.  Or maybe I should say Lisa's house shares this majestic Oak's ground.  Immense and stalwart, it is impossible to ignore.  And nearly impossible to photograph, at least with a phone.  How can I give you a sense of it when I can't possibly fit it into the frame?

. . . maybe that's how.  Let it spill out of all four corners, too much for the camera.

I'm reading Lab Girl by Hope Jahren--a lovely ode to science and nature, with trees taking center stage.  Yesterday, I had to put the book down after reading about a lotus seed that scientists nudged into sprouting--two thousand years after it'd dropped from its mama.

"This tiny seed had stubbornly kept up the hope of its own future while entire human civilizations rose and fell.  And then, one day, this tiny plant's yearning finally burst forth."  Jahren goes on to describe all seeds as being "alive and fervently wishing to be."

She might as well have been describing all living things, myself included.

It's true that I anthropomorphize just about everything, from trees to bugs to mammals, imbuing within them a swirl of hopes and emotions.  I don't think I do it because I'm so nuts about humanity and want to give nonhumans something to aim for.  Rather, I think I do it because it is the lens through which I see this world.  That said, I believe I am kinder to this world when I imagine its beating heart, when I see all things "alive and fervently wishing to be."   

Naming Names

I’m not sure I’ve ever bought into the whole “made in the image of God” thing.  For one, it seems a bit insulting to the divine, given our propensity towards appalling behavior. Besides that, it’s incredibly self-centered of humans to assume that we are god-like.   Give us a God complex and suddenly we start bellowing “Dominion this!  Dominion that!” like we own the place.   It’s all a little too much Old-Testament testosterone for my tastes

But I do like the idea of naming things.  And there’s no question that naming things is a godly activity.  

Names are often the first intelligible words we utter, which suggests that we are born with a need to name.  Mama.  Dada.  Rasta (yeah, Eric’s first word was the dog’s name.  Either that, or he was declaring his religious preferences).  Name something and then, in some mystical way, that thing somehow comes into being.  Which begs the question, without the word for something, does that thing actually exist?

Philologists--folks who study words and meaning--have found some compelling evidence that names and existence are closely tied.

The Egyptians were the first culture to name the color blue.  Prior to that, there is no mention in historical texts of that color.  And, even today, in the Himba tribe in Namibia, where there is no name for ‘blue,’ its members are unable to distinguish a blue square from a collection of green ones.  Hence, there is no blue there.  But the Himba also have far more words for ‘green’ than we have, which means they can discern types of green that we can't even see.  I like knowing that there are colors of green out there that I do not even recognize because I have no name for them.

Most of us have heard about Eskimos and how they have 50 distinct words for ‘snow.’  One could argue, I suppose, that when you are trapped inside while yet another raging blizzard roars on, what else is there to do but to come up with new words for the same old, same old?  A more accurate explanation, though, is that Eskimos have a keener eye, when it comes to snow.

Perhaps the key to our godly evolutions, then, is the acquisition of additional names for something that only has one name to us.  Beetles, for instance.  And then,  we dig in, sit back, listen and observe.  Intently.  Until one day when that one name explodes into 350,000 names.  

Tiger beetle.  Stag beetle.  Rhinoceros beetle.  Ladybird, firefly, predacious, soldier.  Blister, click and weevil.  

Oh, my.  

Naming names may not make me a god, but it does leave me breathless and amazed, suddenly aware of all the stardust and magic swirling around me.  And, in the naming,  I realize that I cannot unsee this wild space, where even 350,000 names are not enough for this thing I’d once simply called “beetle.”

Ready, Aim . . . Now What?!

Last weekend, I mostly had fun trying new things.  "Mostly" because I was shooting guns and throwing hatchets and sending arrows flying errantly in a general direction, any and all of which could do real harm.  Not a typical Saturday, to be sure.  Punctuated between the fears of scalping myself and blowing up a passing bird,  I gained some confidence, though,  and had a few laughs with my pals.

It wasn't an easy outing for me.  Some friends wondered what the heck we were doing, paying to shoot guns and throw sharp things. My daughter joked that I'd be joining the NRA soon.   And I was nervous because, the last time I'd done archery, I ended up looking like I'd done heroin instead, my arm bumpy and bruised for weeks to follow.  Plus, guns.

But I was glad I was there with Kari and Jennifer and new friend Amy, who pretty much owned the air with her shotgun skills.  It was important to me to do something that--right or wrong--has been painted into a corner these days.  And, in some ways, it was a Katie Perry moment for me.

I shot a gun and I liked it.

. . . well, sort of. 

That same, middling dissonance has accompanied me this whole school year, as well.  I've loved it.  . . . kind of.  And that realization makes me pause.  I mean, how on earth couldn't I have loved this school year, if for no other reason than because of its glaring absence of cancer and death?

Turns out that, for all my talk about choosing to live in the messy middle, it's possible that it's not all wine and roses.

Duh.

What I don't know, though, is if this post-cancer, post mom's-death weirdness is common.  Or if I'm in this boat alone. Although I suspect there are many boats on this particular stretch of water.  We just don't talk about them.

What I have learned in the past year is that no one (except another post-cancer friend) is interested in hearing about the side effects of the drug that is "freaking saving your life every day!"  That's why the cancer tribe is so important to me.  Just yesterday, for instance, I spent time with a friend who'd been in similar shoes the past year and, within about 4 seconds, we'd gone straight to the grimy details, both relieved to know that we weren't alone. 

And then there's this pesky mosquito buzzing in my ear, asking what's wrong with me that I haven't embraced post-cancer life by taking up ultra marathons or kombucha or Mahayana Buddhism.

The middle can be so damned middling at times.  And immensely unpopular.  Surely this isn't news to me.  So, occasionally,  I remind myself about the importance of living in that messy space, where different lives and different experiences intersect.  Where this wild life--warts and arrows and bullets and all--pulses in such complicated and beautiful ways.  And I realize that the middle is my home, and I'm glad for it.

Having a Not-So-Fresh Thyme

Maybe it's because Lent ended a week ago--not that I did anything sacrificial for those forty days, unless you count limiting chocolate to two meals a day--but I felt a little on edge at Fresh Thyme this morning.

First, there was the super hip couple in their faux fur (his) and funky Vans jacket (hers), who seemed to be camping out in front of the sprouted breads.  I practically had to stomp on their Birkenstocks to get them to move.  Then, this pudgy, feral child kept bumping into me as he stared, gape jawed, through the window of the meat counter, oohing and aahing at salmon filets in ways that did not seem natural for a 7-year-old boy.

At one point, I stood by the bok choy, transfixed, as that little organic fart fiddled with the spout of a large urn.  When he finally got it open,  golden honey poured out, pooling at the soles of his light-up natural-colored canvas tennis shoes.  And then--suddenly!--there were two of him, some non-GMO experiment gone awry, and his twin started grabbing maniacally at a now-opened package of honey straws. 

By the time I made it to the yogurts, my progress was stymied by a bearded, dazed man who might have been having a medical event or maybe he was recently transported by the tiny sample of fresh-squeezed acai juice, empty cup in hand.

Moments later, I abandoned my shopping list and headed to the checkout counter, where I watched an older woman in a "She Persisted" t-shirt carefully wrap each piece of her organic produce in a separate plastic bag. 

I might need to start meditating or something. . .

I could not drive to HyVee fast enough (yes, I drove there--so what?!), where I was reunited with my people, most of them a bit frumpy and clad in Husker wear.  Newly relaxed, I felt myself drawn to processed foods, for some reason. And donuts.  And liquor, but I resisted, since there was an East student working the checkout line I was in.  Plus, it wasn't quite 10 a.m., and I didn't want to be that person.

I want to eat well.  I really do.  I want to get giddy about collagen and cauliflower, grass-fed buffalo and beets, but, sometimes, I'm just not up for the circus that comes with all those things.

My Body Politic

Climbing the stairs the other night, I had the distinct feeling that I'd somehow gotten a sliver in my cheek. Yeah, that cheek.  In fact, I can still feel the sting, three days later, as I'm typing this, although I've yet to find the culprit.

How, praytell, does a person get a sliver on her butt cheek while walking up the steps?  It's not as though I was crawling up them, blindly lurching towards the second level.  Not yet, at least.

And it's not like my jeans are made out of bamboo, although I understand they are making all kinds of things out of bamboo, whoever they are.  Anyway, I'm pretty sure my mom jeans are made out of rubber bands or some other kind of weird, denim-colored stretchy stuff.  I don't really like to think about it.

So, when I got to the bedroom, left bun a-stinging, I backed up to the closet mirror and took a gander.  I had no idea how tricky it is to get a decent glance at one's backside.   I'm just grateful Mark didn't walk into the room while I was hunched over, peering through my legs at my sobering reflection.

It's possible I cried myself to sleep that night--a snuffling, tiny cry, thank God.

Three months into my 56th year, I seem to be collecting these kinds of humiliating moments, each one hurling me closer to an eventual existential crisis, hilariously played out on an episode of "America's Funniest Home Videos."   And these moments all have one thing in common--my body.

More than once this week, midway through a coughing attack, I peed myself just a bit.

And just this morning, I caught a glimpse of my elbow, with deep, evenly spaced lines stretched across it, like some kind of latitudinal markings on a sea-farer's map, only more depressing.  I was stunned by the sight and wondered how many years it'd been since I'd last looked at my elbows and how long they'd had these horizontal crinkles on them.  And then I wondered how many of those years I'd spent in short sleeves, horrifying those around me who could not avert their eyes in time.

Most mornings now, I spend the last five minutes before heading to work in the bathroom with a flashlight, inspecting my chin hairs, tweezers frantically pruning my own secret garden.  And, with a cynical snort,  I find myself recalling how none of my teenaged brothers could ever grown much of a decent beard, although Steve and Jack did have pretty good mustaches once, and isn't it ironic that their baby sister may end up winning that particular race?

And I almost forgot to mention Mondays--nose-hair trimming day!

Truth be told, the real reason I'm going to retire in a year is because I love the East High library too much to watch it all go to crap, simply because my body has become some sort of State Fair sideshow act and people can't bring themselves to keep watching it.

It's the right thing to do.

Plus, at this rate of decline, I'm not sure I would be able to get to school on time.

Going Through a Prepositional Phase . . .

It's not like I think about the parts of speech all the time, even though I seem to find myself returning to certain nouns and verbs an awful lot.  But I am a nerd of the word, so it makes sense that, on occasion, I let loose my nerdy little brain and ponder the parts a bit.

What's odd is the part of speech I've been considering of late.  Nothing impressive like a proper noun, or scandalous like an irregular verb.  No, my mind has been on prepositions, without which I couldn't have written this sentence.

The tiniest slice of grammatical life, never one to draw attention to itself, the unpresuming preposition, nonetheless, kills in the soft-skills arena.  That's because a preposition is all about relationships.  Its sole job is to inform us of how things interact.  Or don't.  As my friend Julie Schonewise once told me when I was trying to figure out how the heck to teach them to my Freshman English class, it's prepositions that determine what we might do with that garbage can in the middle of the room.

Considering their relational importance, then, I'd argue that our choice of prepositions deserves as much forethought as the adjectives and adverbs we use, even if they are less fun to say.  And, to the observant bystander, we need to realize that the prepositions we choose can say quite a bit about who and what we are in this world.

Are you just passing through or do you plan on staying over for a bit?

If you see a stranger struggling, are you apt to walk by or walk to him?

Do you judge a book by its cover or by what you find between the covers?

Just adding a preposition to a sentence can change everything, as well.  Consider Finn and our daily outings.  When I walk Finn, I'm fulfilling a duty.  When I walk with Finn, though, I'm much more open to my surroundings.  That tiny preposition pre positions me to have a richer experience, to be more present.

Pre-positioning.  Maybe that's the way we should think about prepositions.  Where is it we want to be in the world--what part do we want to play with the people and things we encounter each day?  If we seek to know more of the world, then we should choose prepositions that allow us to interact with it more.  And if something seems particularly poisonous to us, we can use our prepositions to put some space between the two of us.

Small but mighty, it's the prepositions in our lives that often determine how rich those lives will be.

I Am Stuck on Bandaids, . . .

My school-desk drawer.

Back in my journalism days, you could easily determine my state of mind by how many bandaids were on my fingers.  During weeks when both Yearbook and Newspaper had deadlines, invariably, both thumbs were swaddled in beige Johnson & Johnson blankets.  I'm not a thumb sucker so much as I am a thumb fiddler, and deadlines equal stress equal fiddling.

But it's been 2 1/2 years since my last journalism deadline.  Surely, I've broken up with Bandaids by now.

. . . . .yeah, no.  

The past month, especially, has been hard on my thumbs, but I'm too ashamed to cover both at the same time anymore. Instead, I'm more likely to tuck one of the wounded into a pant pocket or behind a book and hope that no one notices.

Boy, would I love to be able to not notice some things right now.

But how does a public-school employee block out yet another school shooting followed by inane suggestions that, in addition to packing my lunch each day, I should also start packing a gun?  How do I ignore legislative bills that underfund public schools while pampering tiny, private ones, and legislators who propose to politicize school boards? And what is there to say about a dunderheaded governor who invites the NRA to convene in our state, just days after 17 people died from a gun in the hands of a broken, white boy?

I feel like Peter, Paul, AND Mary, but:  Where have all the sane people gone?  

Leave it to science and nature to soothe my savage soul. . . .

A faint radio signal reached the earth recently.  Turns out, a cosmic FM station was playing an oldie that all the scientists had been hungry to hear.  And by "oldie" I mean 13.6 billion years old. 

I don't even begin to claim to understand the idea that some things can be heard as a way of being seen, but, still, I am blown away that scientists have just heard the first whisperings of the very first stars.

Equally mind boggling is the realization that, after the Big Bang, it took millions and millions of years for those first stars to form.  There are times when I am certain that a million years have passed since Trump became president, but this latest astronomical news reminds me I am wrong.  And that I have no patience whatsoever.

If millions of years really did pass between the Big Bang and the formation of the first stars, the educator in me asks what there is to learn in this lesson.

I think the most important lesson is that, cosmologically, at least, this past year has been but a speck, if even that.  So I should be willing to hunker down, do the hard work of living, and trust that my work will pay off.  Eventually.

And still I wonder.  In the midst of all this large time, is it strange to say that I am comforted by my insignificance, relieved that my time is but a tiny wisp in the grand scheme of things?

Over and over and over again, I find my balance by turning to the larger world.  This time, though,  my healing comes from a salve that is much older than this very earth that I walk upon.  Its source lives in a whisper that waited millions of years to find its voice.

I say enough with the Bandaids.  Instead, I will hold my mucked-up hands skyward, trusting that, in time, the healing will come.

The Messy Middle

From managing the side effects of being 56 (chin hairs and waist line and stiffness--oh, my!) to trying to find the right tone for voicing my concerns, you could say that I’m living life in the messy middle right now.  I’m not complaining.  It’s the place I generally prefer to be, even though--as the name suggests--it can be a bit of a wreck.

When it comes to finding the right balance for my voice, that messy middle can also be a lonely place.  Especially these days, when the bellicose bookends tend to get all the attention.  

With so much discourse now framed against a “with us or against us” backdrop (as though we can only be one or the other), we are overdue for a societal shift back to that messy middle, despite its current unpopularity.  It is there, I believe, where we will find the best (the most human, most honest) versions of ourselves and each other.  

But it ain’t no picnic.

In her new book “Braving the Wilderness,” Brene’ Brown explores the importance of that messy middle (what she calls ‘the wilderness’), as well as our need to be connected to each other.  She acknowledges, though, that there can be great discomfort when we meet each other in that wilderness, especially when we vehemently disagree with each other.

My favorite chapter is “Speak Truth to Bullshit.  Be Civil.”  The first is a challenge that requires some courage.  But the second?  Speaking civilly to the bullshitter?  Well, now you’re just talking crazy.

Herein is the scary darkness of the wilderness.  But herein also is the path that will get us through it.

In the past year, I’ve felt anger more often than I’d felt it in all 55 years before it. So much indignity, so many offenses, such cavalier dismissal of truth . . . at times, I’ve been disheartened and exhausted. What’s gotten me through is my willingness to spend some time in the messy middle, looking for threads--however tenuous--that connect me to them.  And you know what?  I can always find a thread.  

Always.

And what do I do with these threads when I find them?  I weave them into a letter to a congressman, into a phone call to the governor's office,  I walk them up with me as I stand before a legislative committee to discuss something that concerns me.  Without these threads, without that common ground and some civility, I'm certain my words would fall on deaf ears.  And I am looking for ears and eyes wide open.

If we’re going to meet in the middle, then we're both going to have to move a bit.  No doubt, it’ll be messy at times, but I’m counting on those threads to make it a little less scary.  

Yes, Indeed, I'm Walkin'

It was during the summer of 1984 when I first realized that I could just . . . walk somewhere, if I wanted to get there.  I was living in a bit of a hovel on S. 13th Street, and one morning, I woke with a hankering to visit my mom, who lived across town, maybe 5 or 6 miles away.  Because I had the time, and the legs, and the curiosity about what it would be like, I walked to her house that day.

It was wonderful.

A succession of dogs--coupled with a few decades of summers off--have made sure that I would keep up that tradition.

Lucky, lucky me.

Yesterday, I relished two terrific--and very different--walks.  The first, at Holmes Lake, was a quiet and welcomed return to snowless paths and warmer temperatures, two conditions that Finn's Portuguese paws required.

We headed up the dam, Finn sniffing the grasses for skittering voles, and me scanning the leeward side, hoping to see a fox or a coyote.  Halfway across the dam, my monkey mind now silent, I started to find my groove. That's when I noticed a lone ice fisherman inching across the lake, pulling a sled behind him.  And I began to think about the ice and walking on the water and things both biblical and scientific.

My thoughts were interrupted by the mournful call of a solitary goose, the sight of seed-speckled scat, the smell of cold, clean air.  They were exactly what the doctor had ordered, especially following a student-and-stimulus-heavy Friday at school.  I was hungry for something that did not involve humans and I found it, in spades.

By 2:30, though--revived and relaxed--I was ready for my peeps.  And I found them, in droves, just north of the Student Union.  Not a goose or a vole in sight, my afternoon walk was filled with passionate people who spanned a beautiful spectrum of age and culture and identity.  We walked and laughed and chanted together, eventually making our way to the steps of our stunningly beautiful capitol building, where, we hoped, equality really is before the law.

---------

I have lots of friends who run and every one of them tells me how awesome it is, pumping legs and blood and air in equal measure.    I hate to think of them as liars, and I suppose it is possible (though not probable) that something pleasurable comes from all that work.  But, every time I put feet to ground and saunter along a path, I am certain that walking is the ultimate way to see and experience this wonderful world, my heart rate low and easy, my senses happily working overtime.

Twelve Reasons Why

I admit it. I was more than a bit befuddled, come Dec. 31.  I mean, it's not like 2017 was the year I got cancer or the year my mom died.  So how on earth could the end of 2017 feel worse to me than the end of the previous year?  Why did the end of it feel so . . . exhausting? 

. . . yeah, you don't need to be a genius to figure it out.

So let's go a different route instead.  Below are 12 photos that represent 12 awesome moments for me in 2017.  Because, I need to focus on the wins.  They are the things that'll feed me for years to come.

JANUARY: THE WOMEN'S MARCH

Millions of women from hundreds of countries speaking in dozens of tongues stood up and said "Enough"  Thank God my friend Mary Anne nudged me to join her that afternoon.  It was, it turned out, a crossroads moment for me.  I would go on to attend 4 or 5 other marches this year, each time, my voice growing stronger.



FEBRUARY: A FROZEN LANDSCAPE

Let's hear it for Cuddleduds and goose feathers!  One frigid Saturday in February--thanks to Doug Wells and the Nebraska Master Naturalists--I was at Platte River State Park, getting schooled in its cultural, economic and natural history.  We meandered to the far corners of that land and, while the cold was intense, the experience was amazingly warming.

MARCH: PILEATED WOODPECKER
My March moment was a hard one to choose, thanks to a great visit with family in Indiana.  The journalist in me is disappointed I didn't count my sighting of a Gutenberg Bible as the highlight--so many people liberated by that danged device of his!  But the bird nerd in me had waited 55 years to see my first Pileated Woodpecker, so perhaps I could be granted some kind of forgiveness for losing my cool on a dirt road just outside of Bloomington, while a  nearby tree was getting the bejeezus pounded out of it!

APRIL: NEIGHBORHOOD SHENANIGANS
How lucky am I to live on this short street in the middle of Lincoln?  Filled with kind and funny people who keep me on my toes, this is a good place to live.  And the fact that Randy owns a garbage-collection business and keeps his eyes out for jewels to plant in everyone's yards?  Yeah, pinch me!

MAY:  STAR POWER
Granted, I literally housed Allison Holt for nine months in '95, but I'd like to think that I'm an unbiased observer of someone who clearly possesses grit and creativity, in equal measure.  So, when she won Best Director and a butt load of other awards for her film "Up River" (click the link!), I was delighted that she'd gotten a nod from other, less-chromosomally connected individuals than I.

JUNE:  HAWAII SIX-O!
Perennial cheapskates, Mark and I came out of 2016 with a willingness to live large, if only once!  So we invited our kids, along with Kate and Zach, to join us for 7 magical days in Kauai, where we said 'no' to almost nothing.  It was an unbelievable experience.

JULY:  BUGMASTER NATION
Two full days on East Campus, learning about bugs both beloved (think bees) and despised (think ticks and bedbugs) was just what I needed this July!  And my time with the bees was especially impactful, given that I went home and built the first thing I'd made since I put together a CD rack in 1992.  Bee Hotel chez Holt is open for business!

AUGUST: SWOONING AT THE SKY!
This was a top-ten day for me, despite the fact that, in my absence, I was on tenuous grounds with my employer!  My childhood friend Julie came from Boston to join the gang in Cortland, just to stare at the place in the sky where the sun was supposed to be.  That millions of people all across the continent stared up into the sky, gape-jawed, renewed my faith in our species.

SEPTEMBER:  PAINTED LADIES!
Nature is a master teacher.  I know this because, before this fall, I couldn't have cared less about Painted Lady butterflies.  Bo-ring!  But, when they showed up by the hundreds in our humble garden?  And when Denver radar actually picked them up on its satellites?  Well, yeah.  I'm not stupid!  I know a beautiful thing when I see it!  How many days in September did I rush home from school and head directly to our garden, to count our lovely visitors?  Fingers crossed they remember us, come Fall 2018.

OCTOBER:  LITTLE FREE LIBRARY FUN
One night in October, 30 East High Spartans spent the evening playing with and handing out candy to hundreds of Everett Elementary students and their parents.  I think that, when I retire in a year and a half, I will count the East High Little Free Library project as a highlight of my 30+ years in education.  So many people, young and old, coming together because reading rocks. . . What's not to love about that?

NOVEMBER:  FOXY FUN!
One day before my favorite holiday (Thanksgiving--duh!), two wonderful things happened.  I saw a fox in our backyard and I found out that an Everett neighbor was willing to have a Little Free Library in their front yard.  By midmorning, I was simply beside myself, in love with this wonderful world of ours.

DECEMBER:  HUSKER VOLLEYBALL!
Between being a mom and a public educator, it's no wonder that I fell in love with the Husker Volleyball team this year.  A rag-tag collection of women who, through love and grit and crazy plays at the net, took home the gold.  As though they hadn't already won the gold . . . .