Writiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!

I know, I've been out of touch for a while.  That's pretty much my MO.  I'm back tonight, though, and the reason is that writing here inspires me to write elsewhere and I just saw a clip of the second Divergent movie on Jimmy Fallon.  Those books were so awful that I feel that, at some point, the girls of the world should read my YA work, not just shit (I know not all YA work is shit; I've read some very good YA).  I'm tired of the girl always being the leader (hello, something I never thought I'd say); the girls in my short-story collection are in shitty situations, but they're just normal girls.  They're what would any girl in the world would be like if her world fell apart around her.  (Yes, they're post-apocalyptic; that's my jam.  I know it's overdone.)

I want the girls who read my stories to see themselves.  Some of them are fat.  Some of them are skinny.  Some have glasses and that's a problem in the new worlds in which they live.  Some of them have allergies.  It's not as if each girl has one of these, as some kind of avatar by which you can identify her; they're just regular, like regular people.  Some people write regular people well, some people don't.  I think it's one of my strong suits; trust me, my weak suits are too many to mention here. God knows my students give me enough material to work with; I may work in a small school, but it's like a microcosm.  With just thirty girls, it's amazing what you can see.  You also get to know them well enough to see their complexity.  No one is just who they appear to be on the first day you meet them.  And I guess what I really want to do with my writing is to show girls that I get them.  I guess that's kinda dorky, but it's why I got into teaching.  Because I remember acutely what it was like to be 16 and I know that if anything major had happened in the world when I was that age, I know I would have crumbled.  The girls in my stories are the ones who would tell you, "I can't handle it.  I can't live without my phone or my flat iron." But then they do.  Because they are more than even they think they are.  Isn't it silly, that we can see that stuff in other people, but rarely in ourselves?

I'm totally therapy-izing here.  (I once went on a date with a psychiatrist, and I had to tell him to quit therapy-izing me.  It was weird and gross.  I don't go around trying to teach people Hamlet on dates.)  I guess that's at least part of what this blog is about, therapy-izing myself a little bit.  I hope it works! Fingers crossed.

Ugh, there is a commercial for the sitcom "One Big Happy" and of course the black nurse in the commercial is sassy.  Talk about stereotypes.  One of my stories is going to be about a black girl who is decidedly un-sassy.

Time's up!

Reject!

I got another rejection letter from a private school today.  When I got the first one I told a friend, "It doesn't matter; I just need a handful to interview me and one to hire me."  Which is still true, technically, but I've been at this for a month and a half and so far, no joy.  I told my principals that if I'm at my current school again next year, it won't be a consolation prize, and that is true; I love my students and I love my job.  But the fact is that it's part-time and every year I stay there is another year I have to defer my student loans, meaning that my time there is four years total, max (I began this job a year before I finished grad school).  I would much rather find a job this year than next (or, Flying Spaghetti monster forbid, the next) because I don't want to run up against an enormous deadline like that.

My dream scenario is this (consider this my vision board): I get a job this year at a tony boarding school that pays me more than twice what I'm making now and free housing (these schools do actually offer this stuff; it's not entirely a pipe dream).  I take half that salary that I'm not accustomed to making, and pay off all my student loans in 4 years, maybe less.  Even better would be getting a job at one of the schools that offers travel stipends.  Hey, I didn't win the Powerball last week; I gotta start dreaming somewhere.

I'm sure the fact that I did undergrad and grad school at the same (state) school gets me the boot at lots of places, but I do have a really good résumé, with lots of subbing, teaching, and freaking student-teaching in China, for crying out loud.  I've worked at coed schools, single-gender schools, public schools, private schools, classes with seven students, classes with 70 students... and I know a lot.  Not to toot my own horn, but that's what job searches are all about.  I got my current job based on my vocabulary in the interview; I'm also good at grammar, usage, punctuation, content area knowledge, and I've become pretty adept at teaching writing.  I'm not perfect, by far, but I'm always in pursuit of better methods and practices, and I work hard to make sure my students learn.

This has gotten weird.  I feel like I'm treating you as if you might have a teaching job to give me.  Which, if you do, hit me up.  I'm really not so bad.  Teens love me, and they learn from me.

But really, is a full-time job so much to ask? Maybe it is.  It took me two years out of undergrad plus three sub jobs to land this job so maybe my dream job is going to ask much more of me.  I'd be willing to give it, if I knew exactly how much it wanted of me.  If I knew that, after three years of part-time teaching plus an MA would get me my dream job, I'd patiently wait it out until next year.  Without that certainty, though, I just have to keep pounding the "pavement" and pushing.

Time.

It's Time for Valentimes!

Valentine's Day has always been a non-issue for me.  I have literally only been in a relationship for one of them, and he and I were both sick with some nasty-ass gut bug and he sent me a fucking Vermont Teddy Bear to work.  We hadn't been together for long so he might have been forgiven, but he'd gotten me a pink iPod for Christmas (this one [that's not an affiliate link] [that year, those iPods were THE SHIT] [literally, that's how long it's been since I've been in a relationship]) so he knew what he was doing, or should have.  Then again, he also got me a heart-shaped-sapphire ring, so what did he know? Not me, that's for sure.  I don't hate Valentine's Day the way many perpetually single people do, but I don't love it.  When I briefly dated a dude in November (seriously, this is my love life) I told him that if we were still together in February, not to bother.  We weren't, largely due to his excessive "partying," so, non-issue.

So yesterday, I napped all day then went to visit my cousin's new puppy who is only 10 weeks old but is already as big as 10-month-old Moxie.  He's a sweet baby but even sweeter was Sandy's adult dog, Tucker, who was crazy jealous.  When I called the puppies over to me, Tucker planted his enormous self right in front of me and claimed all the pets and love he had a right to.  Puppies suck up all the attention in the room.

I always think I want to fall in love, but I truly do enjoy being alone.  I like myself and until I find someone who a) likes me as much as I like myself and b) I like as much as I like myself, I'm not gonna waste my time.  I want it to be a damn mutual appreciation society.  I'm not averse to compromise, but we better be damned crazy about each other.  I don't need to get married, but I need not to have kids.  Someone preloaded with kids is fine, I would make an amazing stepmother.  So until Tom Hiddleston gets married, has two adorable children, gets divorced, and finds me, I can wait.  I'm patient about few things in my life, but this one, I can wait for.  In the meantime, February can mean 50%-off conversation hearts on the 15th.  Mostly the white ones, because they're mint.

Friday the 13th

I try very hard not to be superstitious.  I don't even believe in God, so superstitions seem like cheating.  Weirdly, though, Friday the 13th has traditionally been a good day for me.  Which is excellent this year, when we're to have three.  I really hit the jackpot in 2015.

I had an 8 am dental appointment yesterday, which I know to many people will seem like bad luck, but I love the dentist.  Love it.  Love going, love getting x-rays done, love getting my teeth cleaned, and love all the gross-ass tartar that I've allowed to accumulate behind my front bottom teeth picked off... I've always said that if I ever win the lottery (which I did not do this week, FYI), I'd have an in-home massage therapist and a standing monthly dental cleaning.  It's just THE BEST.  I love looking at how secretly long my teeth are in the x-rays.  And my old dentist had been my dentist for well over half my life.  But for some reason once he found out I work for a Jewish school, he felt like it was OK to make anti-Semitic jokes.  He was elbows-deep in my mouth at the time, filling a cavity, and I just lay there, shamefully, not saying a word.  I still feel bad about this.  It was a year and a half ago and it will probably haunt me for the rest of my life.  I couldn't go back, though, and so I've been dentistless for a while.  Then I saw a dental office near my house offering $59 cleaning, exam, and x-rays to new patients.

First thing the dentist said? "I saw you work for a Hebrew school.  My husband is Conservative and I'm going through the conversion process.  We want to send our kids to a Jewish school.  Let's talk."  I LOVE HER.  I found my bizarro dentist - he was old, male, casually racist against Jews.  She's young, female, BECOMING A JEW.  And she was an excellent dentist as well, but at that point she could have turned into Steve Martin in Little Shop of Horrors and I almost would not have cared.  The hygienist had a really soft touch and still managed an excellent job of cleaning my teeth, and overall, it was a great experience.  They're much pricier overall than my last dentist, but fingers crossed that by the next time I need a cleaning I'll have a full-time job with dental insurance.

Right now I'm in "I'll never skip flossing again" mode, which is a mode I enter into for about two weeks following every dental visit.  I'm incredibly lazy, I have a small mouth, and I have major ick issues with those individual flossers - I can't use the same section of floss between more than one pair of teeth and I would need a third job to pay for all the flossers I would use because I can't use one twice.  So after I get gung ho I typically forget one night and then two and then forever and then my bottom teeth fuse together in a single tooth/tartar hybrid.  What I'm saying is, I'm really good at being an adult and I'm really sexy.

Time's up, but this is related, and it's my all-time favorite television tooth moment ever:


 The best parts are at 3:49 and 3:54.  Enjoy!

Hiatus: Over

If you don't already know me, you need to know that I am the absolute worst at keeping up with stuff like this.  I'm determined, though, so I'm posting back issues.  Let's start with Thursday.

I had a pretty legit reason for not posting that night.  I actually had plans: I went with my friends Cora and Racheal to see The Vagina Monologues.  I had never seen the show before largely because this is exactly the type of thing I hate.  I don't need to hear about your womanhood, and I hate hippie shit.  It turns out the show was mostly lacking in hippie shit until the end, when all the cast members stood onstage and told us we needed to quick fracking because it was ruining the earth, which is everyone's vagina.  Or something.  I'm anti-fracking, of course, but it was such a weird tie-in, I couldn't handle it.

Not only did I think the show was going to be a bunch of Kumbaya, but I thought it was going to be women speechifying about their own vaginas.  I didn't realize it was pre-written.  I thought when a person auditioned she did so with her own speech about how much she loves her lady parts; not so.  This was mostly written in 1996 and apparently a speech is added every year.  So, OK.  Completely scripted.  Some of the stories (based on interviews) were excellent.  Some made me incredibly sad, some made me laugh, two almost made me sob aloud (those two were the one about trans women and the one about Bosnian women raped during the civil war).  I really had to keep myself together to weep silently.  I left thinking, I enjoyed that.  It was good. I'm glad I went.

And I still am, but...

It was really reductive.  Vagina=woman=vagina.  You are your vagina, it is you.  Period.  I would have liked there to be some nod to the possibility that women are more than the sum of our parts.  Don't we get put in boxes (ha ha) enough by the patriarchal society the show claims to be against? Why do it to ourselves?  And another thing... it didn't seem like Eve Ensler (the playwright) or any of the women who put the show on actually know... what the vagina... is.  If you don't, don't be ashamed.  Many women are unfamiliar with their reproductive system.  If you can see it with a hand mirror, it's your vulva.  The vagina is one part of the reproductive system, and it's inside.  No Hollywood actress has ever accidentally flashed her vagina getting out of a car; she's flashed her vulva.

I typically don't go around correcting people about that stuff because I'm a pedant and it's a weakness and I don't need the whole wide world to know it all the time, but you'd think a play called The Vagina Monologues would address the misnomer.  It was weirdly unsettling.  I mean, go see the play it if you get a chance.  If nothing else, the proceeds typically go to serve abused women in the community, so that's a good reason.

TIME'S UP!

Weird Line-Up

I didn't work on my film yesterday because I did my blogging and writing away from home and all my film stuff was at home.  Which I guess is an excuse.  I suppose I should stop making those.  Hm.  Food for thought, that.  At any rate, I did do the blogging and writing, so that's a 66%.  Passing, by just a smidge.

It feels weird and good to be creating again.  Just the act of it is wonderful.  Nothing I've ever made is a masterpiece: I paint for my own pleasure, and because my students enjoy bidding on my paintings at a charity auction they hold every year.  I used to draw during classes but now that I'm finished with school I've tossed my sketch book, though I can't bring myself to get rid of the gel pens I used.  Those things are expensive.  I used to do a little papercraft, though that was really more about buying a lot of scrapbooking paper.  Now I take piles of it to school and let my students occasionally do "setting" posters with them.  I have an entire tackle box full of jewelry tools and beads and odds and ends, but I haven't done jewelry in forever.  It's likely I never will but I've been known to pick up a hobby again after a dormant decade, so I refuse to get rid of it.  Film probably won't last as a hobby but that's OK because I already have all the materials and tools necessary to do it, so I'm not laying out any money and it's keeping me off the street.

My breath is kickin'.  I had garlic for lunch (not just garlic, though I could totally do that) and I just had some Oreos.  Together, they are stirring up a real stink inside my face.  Be glad there are two screens and a series of tubes separating you and me.  I have a short week at work this week (no school tomorrow or Friday), and I'm going to win the Powerball tonight.  What's not to love, right?  I somehow even managed not to nap tonight.  Napping is my Achilles heel in the winter.  When the sun dips below the horizon so early and everything's all dark and closed in... it's not as if I'm a water skier or mountain climber in spring and summer, but it's a hell of a lot easier to stay up when my body's not trying to convince me that it' hibernation time.  I think I might be part bear.  That would explain a lot of things about my life.

I need to make an appointment at a new dentist.  I'm terrified, which is odd.  I've always loved the dentist; I love getting all the crap cleaned out of my teeth (confession time: I'm the worst about flossing.  THE. WORST) and all of it.  I used to love my dentist, until he made misogynist and anti-Semitic jokes last year.  I also think he might have screwed up my filling (which I'll find out when I see the new dentist), but I'd have gone back to get it fixed if it hadn't been for the jokes.  Like, who does that? He's probably in his sixties and typically I give olds a pass on casual sexism and racism, but the fact is this: I'm 36 now - 60 isn't old anymore.  It's certainly no longer old enough to have been around for a significant amount of time before the civil rights movement.  And this isn't even the South!  (I mean, MO was a slave state, but it wasn't actually part of the Confederacy.)  Not that racists aren't everywhere, and god knows there are enough people who drive around with Confederate flag bumper stickers...

OK, times up!

How I Spend My Days

Confession time: I've been spending more than an embarrassing amount of time playing The Sims lately.  I go through phases with the game; before this I hadn't played it in over a year.  There are some times, though, when my life isn't as exciting or as fulfilling as I'd like it to be, and The Sims doesn't solve that problem but it allows me to extract myself from it for a while.

It's soothing.

It's really really fake.

Which is why I'm so glad Sharon came up with blogging 10 minutes per day, because yesterday, following my post, I then wrote on a short story for 10 minutes, and then worked on my animated film for 10 minutes.  I wrote a storyline sketch and began storyboarding.  So I took a half-hour out of my clearly super-busy Sims schedule and, instead of dictating the lives of the people who live in my computer, I actually created. I made something.  I worked on making somethings.  Which is pretty cool, and very satisfying.  I've been vacillating for nine months now, ever since finishing grad school.  For so long, my identity was wrapped up in being a student; I had been one, full-time, for six years.  And then... it was over.  I wasn't a student anymore.  I didn't have to cram in a thousand pages of reading over each weekend.  I had all this free time, but the freedom was restrictive.  It was up to me to decide what to do with my time.  I had no priorities imposed upon me.

I believe (and hope to experience someday) that this is what happens to people who win the lottery.  If I were to win, I'd keep my part-time teaching job.  I don't do well without somewhere to go every day.  I need structure.  I need someone to boss me.  I need to be on a schedule, at least to some degree.  I would take my time off to travel and spend my mornings getting Swedish massages in my home (of course), but every afternoon, just as now, I would report for duty and do what I love.

Maybe that's my issue now: I bitched and moaned, just because that's my personality, but I truly loved being a student.  If I won the lottery I'd go back and get another degree, in something completely different.  I would keep pushing myself and developing and growing as a person.  That's what education really is about, isn't it?  It's what we learn, but it's also how what we learn changes us.  It's a selfish endeavor, sure, but I think ultimately it's less selfish than not ever growing as a human being.  When we don't grow, those around us suffer.  We don't usually notice when we're not growing, at least while the stagnation is going on.  At least I don't; I went through a period of stagnation in my 20s, brought on by depression.  At the time I didn't realize it was happening; only after getting a good job and medication did I realize what was awaiting me in the world.  I had thought I'd reached my limit, but I know now that my potential is nearly unlimited.  It's unlikely I'll be a brain surgeon, but there's nothing wrong with exploring that possibility.

Time's up.  Gotta go.  Thanks for indulging me.