So, this semester I’ve been trying something new: one evening a week I have office hours at a local coffeeshop. I head out after the Little People are in bed. Mostly it’s been upper division students who come by to chat about literature, hang out, and/or knit and crochet. This week, there was someone waiting for me when I arrived. My general education students are working hard on a paper that’s due tomorrow, and three of them turned up. It was nice, actually. We had productive conversations; they were relaxed and willing to take their time thinking about their ideas. The whole coffeeshop hour was an experiment, but I think it’s been worth it. It’s created a less hierarchical option for students. I was worried that the extra burden of traveling to the coffeeshop would be too much of a barrier, but that doesn’t seem to have been too problematic. For some students, the slightly formal environment of the faculty office can be a little intimidating (they relax visibly when they see the messy stack on my desk return), and the coffeeshop seems to be a bit more relaxing. We sit next to each other on a couch and chat about books. What’s not to love about that?!
OK, so this morning at the Little Guy’s school, there was a sudden huddle on the playground: a little boy was laying on the ground near the jungle gym. Parents and teachers ran to him, but the teacher didn’t seem terribly worried. A mother explained to me as we were leaving: “He likes to fake his own death.” Apparently this is a regular thing. Her reaction was, “Sign him up for drama.” My reaction? “No more TV for this kid.”
My Little Guy was completely oblivious to the whole event.
Well, we got into Kindred today. It was pretty exciting for me, actually — this is the third time I’ve taught this book, but I structured the whole course differently this semester, and that changed the way we talked about the book today.
In the course, we talked generally about approaching literature from reader-oriented, text-oriented, and society-oriented perspectives; today we talked generally about how thinking about this book from these three perspectives can start us on our analysis. Not only was it clear that they had in fact learned something earlier in the semester, but our general discussion was interesting and brought up some exciting ideas about the book.
Well, the Little Guy and I had a very verbal afternoon. Miss Baby was along for the ride, chatting along, but the Little Guy had a lot to say today.
On the way home from school, we stopped at the playground. The Little Guy wanted to run ahead and play while I went into the bathroom, and didn’t like it when I said no. He said, “But I will be careful not to get hurt.” This was why he thought I wouldn’t let him on the playground alone, and it is a good reason. I agreed with him, but then I had to explain that I was also worried about other people.
“You mean bad guys.”
“Yes, I do.”
“I could get killed.”
“Well, someone could hurt you, or take you away.”
“And you know how to stop them. How do you stop them?”
“Usually the bad guys will stay away if they see a mommy with you. I could call the police with my phone.”
“And they don’t want that, because the police will catch them.”
He was OK with this; he wasn’t freaked out, he played happily. But I wanted him to understand that he needed to stick with me.
On the way home from the playground, we had a very sweet conversation. The Little Guy is, in all seriousness, working on learning to fly. In case you’re wondering, long jumps are his preferred practice method. He talked abouthis plans for flying over the fence at school, and then flying over all the fences. He said that someone would need to learn to fly to catch him, so now I need to learn to fly too. Miss Baby will learn to fly too, and he was speculating on what people will say when they see her flying around the world. When he suggested that she could fly around the world in one day, I commented that this seemed very fast, like Superman, and he amended it: she will fly around the world in a day and half a night. He speculated about what people would say when they saw the two of us flying overhead (and I do have to admit I like the mental image myself), and described landing on our roof. I suggested that our neighbors would be surprised to hear him on the roof, and he asked, “Would it be famous? Would they put it in the newspaper? What will Daddy say when he sees it in the newspaper?” I told him it would definitely make the papers, and that his Daddy would be very proud of him. “How can he be proud if I’m the one who does it?” So I had to explain how one could be proud of what someone else does. We talked about how nice it would be to fly to the top of a Norfolk Island Pine and look down at everybody; he smiled gently at the thought of lodging in the tree like a bird.
In the evening, we had an outburst of music. He started with a song that he described as “sad but beautiful,” which included the lyric, “It’s like when someone dies, and the world forgets to keep growing.” Then there was another, happier song, including the lines, “The baby won’t ever grow, taking it slow.”
So today, I go into a class to administer an exam based on the last two weeks of readings, lecturing, and discussion. A student, claiming to speak on behalf of the entire class, asked me to change the deadline for the final paper, and to reschedule today’s exam for later in the week.
Apparently I was supposed to rearrange my end-of-term schedule for her convenience. I’ve actually spread my student assignments across the next three weeks so that everything can be cycled through in time to get my grades done by the provost’s deadline; if I keep on top of things, everything should go smoothly.
The cheek!
And then this afternoon, students in my other, far more difficult class, told me how grateful they were that their paper was due this week. They also have papers in other classes due later than mine, and my schedule staggering is helping them plan their time.
Gosh, which group of students would you have more respect for?
We’re reading Octavia Butler’s Kindred in my general education lit class. A few of the students came to class today, having started the book over the weekend. Here’s the review so far:
“It’s actually good! This is the first good book I’ve read in school.” “Well, To Kill a Mockingbird was good.”
So this is the best book they’ve read since junior high, apparently. I suggested that they might have at least been assigned some good books, even if they hadn’t read them.
So, the Little Guy is in the church kid’s musical. Yesterday at rehearsal, he has a little breakdown — he was having trouble following the music. He’s just learning to read, and reading the words and the music simultaneously and at the same rate as the other kids was difficult. I explained this to him, and consoled him that next week they are supposed to be off-book.
“Then why did they give us the books anyway?” he asked.
So, this evening I was in the kitchen, for some purpose or the other (probably — I might have wandered in there accidentaly. This happens). Miss Baby came in, looked at me, and grabbed my hand –my finger, to be exact — and led me firmly to the bookcase in the living room. She carefully selected a book (Nemo), and thrust it firmly into my hand. We sat down and read for 10-15 minutes. She especially liked the more detailed pictures with many colorful fish.
I was impressed by her intensity and purpose: she knew what she wanted and who she wanted to do it. And of course I was pleased to see my daughter seeking the comforts of literature.
OK, so, on Thanksgiving morning, my DH turned on the Macy’s parade for the Little Guy. He watched it intermittently — he was way more involved with his marble sets — but took especial interest in the commercials, or, as he calls them, “conversionals.” An astute coinage. He doesn’t see conversionals very often; most of his TV viewing is Tivo’d, and often PBS at that. So if there are conversionals, they are fast-forwarded.
At any rate, there was a conversional for a Hallmark TV special, “Pictures of Hollis Woods.” It would appear to feature a lonely, winsome child in need of love and care. He watched it carefully, and then came to me, hugged me, and crawled into my lap. “I love you,” he said. “I don’t need that conversional. I already have what it’s for.”
I thought those ads only affected pregnant women like that.
