Saturday, November 24, 2012

experimentation

http://joyeuxdans.blogspot.com/

With a new year, in a new city, thought it might be time to tweak the blog experience.

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

grrr

am getting some message that I've exceeded my photo storage space.  Which makes no sense to me, as my photos are stored on my laptop, not on this site.

So.  Until I figure this out, there will be no photos from my delightful kick off to a new year of life in NoLa.

Friday, November 16, 2012

unexpected joys


Even the long-beloved
was once
an unrecognized stranger.
Just so,
the chipped lip
of a blue-glazed cup,
blown field
of a yellow curtain,
might also,
flooding and falling,
ruin your heart.

A table painted with roses.
An empty clothesline.

Each time,
the found world surprises—
that is its nature.

And then
what is said by all lovers:
"What fools we were, not to have seen."


"Meeting the Light Completely" by Jane Hirshfield, from The October Palace. © Harper Perennial, 1994.


Here's to seeing.  Here's to recognizing what we're seeing.  And certainly, here's to Friday and the ending of a chaotic week.

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

don't it make my brown eyes...


wait, I have blue eyes;  it just makes them blue-er.  Someone got his wittle hands on Mommy's shirt while she was trying to wash her hair.  Nom-nom-nom!

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

12 angry men...well, actually,


22 thrilled jr. high Mock Trial students who went to criminal court today.



 One of my all-time best field trips---and this list includes a Mozart Festival to Austria.  The kids were well-behaved and our hosts were magnanimous.  Two judges spent quite a bit of time (one completely unscheduled) in talking to my students.   The kids also got to interview two attorneys--one from defense and one on prosecution.  And the court reporter explained her key pad to them and typed all of their names out, so they could see her unique alphabet.


 All Ana could talk about for the past three weeks was that she hoped to bang the judge's gavel.  The judge obligingly found one for all them to try out.





Trying out the cushy juror chairs.


Posing with one of the judges.

I returned to school with the same kids with whom I left; always a relief.  And a big eye-roll as one of their favorite things of the entire outing was being able to peek out the windows of the 8th floor and see the convicts playing ping-pong.  Honestly.  Why do we even try to create lesson plans?

Monday, November 12, 2012

Friday, November 9, 2012

absolute bliss


JJ, doing authentic California dreamin' 
(hanging out with G'pa and G'ma as mommy's in a west coast wedding this weekend.)

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

teacherly thoughts

don't worry, these are PG rated thoughts of the week.


I'd love to make this my standard email reply to 98% of the parents with whom I deal.



And maybe, I'm getting too enthused about the mock trial classes I'm teaching, but this rug struck me as hysterical.   (we just finished watching a Nova segment on forensics, so I have blood and prints on the brain.)

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

paper flowers


My miniature singers (as I call the PreK groups) came skipping in yesterday with bouquets of paper flowers that they had made especially for me.  No reason, just flowers for Ms. Dunston.  It was sweet as most of them signed/scrawled their names on the popsicle sticks.


What was incredibly poignant is that I had just learned that a former choir member had died on Sunday.  So, this was a blissful moment of choral continuity.  I emailed their teachers and told them why I was grateful for these raggedy little flowers.


And yes, I voted this morning.  Stood in line and watched the sun rise with my precinct neighbors.  And as I told my students--it's not so much for whom/what I voted, but that I exercised my citizenly right to do so.  In peace.  And (luckily from what I'm hearing) in an efficient and short line.

And I truly hope that this nonsense is over shortly after midnight. 

Monday, November 5, 2012

diet for life


'I never worry about diets.
The only carrots that interest me
are the number you 
get in a diamond.'

~Mae West


Sunday, November 4, 2012

success


This weekend was the antithesis of busy.  Am please to report that I got spades of slumber over the past couple of days and am beginning to feel healthy again.

Saturday, November 3, 2012

saying yes



There's some dippy movie about a man who is (actually not sure what happens to him--lightening?  malevolent fairy?) anyway, something happens and he can only say yes to everything.  While I've found it healthy to learn how to say 'no' in the past few years, think it's good to keep a balance of saying, yes!


And so, this morning as I complimented Senora Clinton on her gorgeous shawl and asked what they were doing for Dia de los Muertes, she said they were painting sugar skulls and she had extra and invited me to join the class.  This sounded close enough to a field trip, so I said 'si! si!' and jaunted down the hill into the 5th grade Spanish class.


2 seconds later, they were smiling, but my camera froze.





 For some, choosing the sequined eyes took longer than the painting-with-the-frosting/toothpicks.




 The finished product; you wouldn't believe the number of student who volunteered throughout the day to help me eat this mass of sugar.  Perhaps it was cruel of me to leave it on my desk to finished drying?




And so, home.  Between the full moon and the Halloween candy and the Saints' Parade for church (do not ask), this was just the perfect project to wrap up this stretch of academia.  I leave you with an Iris Murdoch quote that may become this year's motto:
~One of the secrets of a happy life is continuous small treats.

Friday, November 2, 2012

reading the fine print


(entrance to the art gallery on the UT campus)

Whatever is foreseen in joy
Must be lived out from day to day.
Vision held open in the dark
By our ten thousand days of work.
Harvest will fill the barn; for that
The hand must ache, the face must sweat.

And yet no leaf or grain is filled
By work of ours; the field is tilled
And left to grace. That we may reap,
Great work is done while we're asleep.

When we work well, a Sabbath mood
Rests on our day, and finds it good.

"X" by Wendell Berry, from A Timbered Choir. © Counterpoint, 1998.


If I were brilliant at math (or truly motivated), I would find out exactly where I am in the ten thousand days of slogging bit of my vision.  But as I'm not, I took myself back to the Blanton Gallery (free Thursdays!) for a palate cleanse of this icky day.


The stairwell, Stacked Water, shimmers one up to the permanent collections where my rooms of cents exists!



Falling Stars does not come across well in a photograph, but it's fairly stunning.  It fills a gallery sized wall and there are labels of stars that have 'fallen' off the painting.  Again, they don't show up here.  I had a nice stare at it while remembering all the star images from a childhood's  fav story, Carry On, My Bowditch.

A restorative ramble.  An extra hour of slumber sometime this weekend. 

Welcome November.

Thursday, November 1, 2012

soul & saint


I think I just found my epitaph!