Yesterday, M brought N to school to meet and greet my colleagues. Here she is, posing with me for a promotional reading project:
After a walk around the track at school, we took her shopping (my favorite department store gave me a $50 gift card to buy semi-healthy prizes for my students), and, finally, came home. She didn’t really get to sleep until nearly 11:00–and slept pretty much nonstop until 6:00. Here she is with M, thrilled to be awake once again:
Next week we may introduce her to my students.
A Happily Ending Poop Saga
For about a month, the dog liberally used every inch of our front yard (and our sidewalk and stepping stones, when the yard was covered with snow) as its defecatory palace.
“I think there’s the culprit,” my dad said to me once, when he and Mom were visiting (M was in labor at the moment). We were looking out the window from our study, where my parents were arguing about which band member was who on a YouTube flick of a Beatles concert. A small dog was waddling up the sidewalk.
Then N came along, and other pooping took priority over the dog’s misdeeds.
However, the dog poop problem kept getting worse. I eventually grew certain, through occasional sightings and the quantitatively expansive evidence, that the dog belonged to the family on the end of our row of townhouses. I contemplated kicking the dog next time I saw it, or buying a bb gun to give it a reason to poop elsewhere, or calling the police, or other frantic measures, just to preserve our territory.
Just this past Sunday afternoon, then, I had a dream. I dreamed that I talked to the son of the household (in my dream it was actually one of my students) about the poop, and he cleaned it up. When I woke up, I figured I was obsessing enough over the situation that I should maybe do something about it, and so I grabbed the shovel and, fifteen minutes later, buried a paper grocery bag full of crap out behind our shed.
But finally, my friends, the outlook brightened, for just as M brought N out in the stroller for our afternoon walk, down our sidewalk came the dog, waddling. I headed straight for him, and in a firm but pleasant manner encouraged him to go home. He turned around (the poor dog was elderly and whimpered with every step) and I followed him all the way to his front door, where we were greeted by His Owner.
We conversed pleasantly, His Owner and I, and I told His Owner that I’d just spent fifteen minutes cleaning his dog’s poop out of our yard, and then praised his son’s middle school choir. His Owner, in turn, apologized profusely, told me that his son’s choir sang at the White House earlier this fall, and said that if we found any more suspicious piles of poop in our yard, to let him know.
Entertainment Quicksand
I like entertainment. An occasional movie, an occasional indulgence in The Simpsons or YouTube samplings, and an occasional donut all suit me fine. That said, our society is severely out of whack.
I learned this morning from a Sunday school classmate who is a professor of music that until the early 1900s, over 90% of people worldwide could sing in tune. In 1997, however, only 35% of Americans could do this. This comment came in the context of a discussion about prayer and how Americans have become distracted away from prayer by all of technological entertainment. My classmate’s point was that our entertainment culture has severely curbed Americans’ ability to pray or participate in corporate worship (worshipful singing in the shower has also begun to tempt God’s wrath).
Now, I’ve heard many conversations (mostly in Sunday school classes, although the debate has been national) about how bad television is. People are often quick to point out television’s horrid
and inane content, the physical and mental inactivity of viewing and the resulting obesity and dumbness (I freely tell my students at school, “TV rots your brains,” to which they protest loudly and call for mutiny), the proliferation of consumerism, the distraction from participation in social activities and from meaningful human interaction, and the fact that if you’re watching TV, you’re not doing something productive or creative (like learning to play an instrument or sing on tune).And never have I seen anyone leave any one of those conversations vowing to cut the cord.
Of course, it’s not only about television, anymore. So many things keep us from practicing our music. For example, cell phones can be great tools, but they also fatally clog communication arteries with meaningless chatter. How often do people dial up just to say, “Hey, man, what’s up?” to “friends” who aren’t talking to anyone physically around them, either, because they’re on the phone? Or, how about personal music players, which seclude individuals from others and leave little space for quiet introspection (ahem, prayer)? Or, how about computers, which can exponentially expand our ability to do any of these things, and more?
In other words, just because I have never and will never own a TV does not make me, an “Ooh, I love technology” owner of both an iPod and a computer, immune from bad entertainment practices. In light of this, here are my recommendations for me and the world, just three questions to ask ourselves when we use technology:
1. Are we cultivating meaningful relationships?
2. Are we being creative?
3. Are we accomplishing necessary tasks?If our use of technology doesn’t help us do at least one of these things, then we might as well grab a bag of chips, turn on the boob tube, and sink into musical quicksand.
My Higher Paying Field
An economics professor named Steven E. Landsburg writes in tomorrow’s Washington Post that the economic stimulus package moving through Congress “is sure to do a lot of collateral damage” and won’t really stimulate the economy in the short or long haul. In the same Post, another economics professor, Andrew A. Samwick, says it should be called not a “stimulus package” but “deficit spending.”
For all I know, they’re right–they’re economists, after all. But $1,200-plus in this household’s pocket doesn’t really bother the personally fiscally sound mind that is mine. My worry is more how to use that money so that I contribute to the health of our world.
Now, I should note that I often just do what I want with the money I have, rather than worry about being a positive influence here on Earth. The thing is, with this possible money, our supposed president is calling me to a higher paying field. As I see it, here are several of my options, a few of which I’m actually considering:
1. Save the money and buy something later, like land.
2. Spend the money(preferably at Target) on unnecessary plastic objects made in China.
3. Invest the money in Ford or some other sinking lunk of steel. My brother did this once.
4. Invest in some sort of green technology that will never be affordable to me unless I invest the tax rebate of today in something like missiles to earn money towards a later purchase of that same green technology, which needs investment now.
5. Spend the money on something cool, like new windows for downstairs so that we can’t feel the breeze outside when we’re inside. This is a good idea because it will save me money in the long run, money that I’ll be glad for later to pay the taxes needed for this year’s possible rebates.The good news, I guess, is that I don’t need to decide right this minute. As it is said, don’t change the diaper before it’s wet.
Sleeping Is Hard Work
A Mellow Drama
C (wincing): I don’t understand this pain.
M: (says nothing)
C: I think I’m having a baby.
M: Hmm.
C: You’re probably thinking, “You have no clue.”
M: That’s so preposterous, I really don’t know what to think.Incapacitated Reflection
If while reading this post you notice a wince, it’s because I moved my left arm.Last evening, tired from my day and tired of the pain in my ribs, I thought about how many people bear for long, long periods of time immobility, inconvenience, and otherwise debilitating discomfort. The tenuousness of comfortable living is just that–tenuousness–and this realization brings an underlying sobriety to the joy of all that is good.
In Costume
Our most recent youth group event was a scavenger hunt in the mall, and I was one of the hunted.For an hour, I skulked around, in a way sheltered from my normal reality: I wore a ball cap, large headphones (Enya and James Taylor helped me tolerate the mall glitz), a scarf, and a long coat. I held in my hand a $4 decaf mocha on ice (I was hot in my coat) until long after its allure faded and I finally tired of slurping whipped cream remnants through the chewed-up straw.
I followed the youth and baited their noticing often quite fruitlessly, most notably when several went up the information desk and started asking questions. I sallied up to the desk, as well, and examined a gift card flyer, until they set off for the other end of the mall, where I watched them via a shop-window reflection. Then I followed them into a smaller wing of the mall.
“There’s nothing here,” the leader of their group said, and they doubled back. I bobbed my head lower and kept on walking, thoroughly enjoying my own anonymity–which ended only thirty seconds later when one of the little twits noticed me.
Vote for Sale
For what it’s worth, I’ll trade my 2008 vote for president for all of the following:
-Elections reform. Do away with party primaries. Instead, have three rounds of voting. In the first round, everyone votes his conscience. In the second round, pick from among the top seven choices made in the first round. In the third round, choose from the top three choices made in the second round.*
-Term limits: Presidents serve one term only, five years long.*
-A public, low-cost health insurance option for all, not tied to employment, not limited to mainstream providers (i.e., certified midwives would be fully acceptable), and funded by cuts in military spending. I also like The Freakwenter‘s idea for subsidizing medical school tuition.*
-A more broadly free market (i.e., no government subsidies or military protection for corn or oil corporations). As part of this free market economy, we need a quick, smooth process for obtaining documentation both for currently undocumented and future immigrants. Providing a legitimate way for people to “enroll in society” enhances the potential for achieving physical security as well as workforce availability and stability.*
-A refocusing of the purpose of our military might to surviving domestic disasters and ensuring border security (again, check out The Freakwenter‘s views, this time regarding “Military and Foreign Policy”).*
-The criminalization of terrorism. We should forget the “War on Terror” as has Britain.*
-Simplification of the tax code to a graduated income tax figured by parabolic formula, with no deductions.*
-NO NCLB or federal regulation of public education. Distribute equally (per capita) federal education funds to local public school districts and community colleges. The free market and local democracies will do the rest.*
-The decriminalization of many of the drug offenses that are filling prisons way too full, way too quickly, way too unnecessarily. We should spend the money instead on good rehab programs and educational scholarships for at-risk youth.*
*I reserve the right to change my mind and edit this post (or remove myself completely from the political arena) as better ideas come along.
Sleepy Friend
N, doing that which she does:
N with her nine-weeks-senior friend C. I don’t think they know they’re friends yet. Actually, I don’t think they know they are, yet.
and inane content, the physical and mental inactivity of viewing and the resulting obesity and dumbness (I freely tell my students at school, “TV rots your brains,” to which they protest loudly and call for mutiny), the proliferation of consumerism, the distraction from participation in social activities and from meaningful human interaction, and the fact that if you’re watching TV, you’re not doing something productive or creative (like learning to play an instrument or sing on tune).
If while reading this post you notice a wince, it’s because I moved my left arm.
Our most recent youth group event was a scavenger hunt in the mall, and I was one of the hunted.
N with her nine-weeks-senior friend C. I don’t think they know they’re friends yet. Actually, I don’t think they know they 