RUBBER
_ _ _ _

Hose! said player 1
Duck! said player 2
Rope! said player 3 (rubber rope? really?)
Ball, thought I.

MASK, was the answer revealed
whereupon Pat, in his inimitable fashion, exclaimed, "Hey! We saved $1,000!"

Oh, Wheel of Fortune, so many laughs you have brought me.

It has been a somber week in the wake of Hurricane Sandy. The Katrina-esque scope of the damage is hard to take in. Unless one has been through such a devastating event, it is impossible to comprehend. As "onlookers" we can pray, remember those who are suffering and will be for some time to come, and give to relief efforts as we are able.

As my friend Debbie said this evening, such circumstances can also spark natural and stimulating conversation starters such as, "If you knew your home would face the potential of being destroyed, what items would you save from it?" and progress from there to talk about what is most important to people--things that are of eternal significance.

These massive natural disasters bind us together as we measure the depth of human suffering, sympathize with those who are angry and frustrated, mourn with those who have experienced immeasurable loss, and think about how we  might respond in a similar situation. We watch the news, knowing that it can only scrape the surface in depicting the scope of the loss, yet weeping with those who weep. We wake in the night and utter a prayer, grateful to be in a warm bed, safe in our homes when so very many are not.

I like the book that Dr. Amidon is having us read for class: Inside Creative Writing, Graeme Harper, ed. With 15 cr hrs to go on my Master's degree after this semester, the academic angst is morphing into career angst: will this degree have any practical application? Will it get me where I want to go? Where exactly do I want to go? Yikes.

This book is a description of the process of creative writing as explained by several writers who were asked a series of thought-provoking questions. The authors interviewed are "people who in some way see creative writing as their profession; or, at very least, something they do with some form of human exchange in mind." p. 17

Without going into great detail on the questions asked or who wrote the responses, here are some of my favorite quotes from the book:

...great writing doesn't just descend in one burst of genius, it evolves over long periods of time. p.22

Childhood plays a considerable role in creative writing beginnings. p.26 (I explored this with my initial piece for the class, "Frosty the Snowflake")

Creative writers take a high degree of personal responsibility for deciding to begin to write, and for continuing to do so. p. 38

and my favorite to date:

What we often don't understand when we start out writing is that writing is re-writing is re-writing is re-writing. p. 44

Tru dat! Good thing I so enjoy the re-writing process.

I trust that my skills will continue to develop and, I hope, bring personal satisfaction and enjoyment to my readers. Whether I will ever be privileged to make a living at it remains to be seen. Inside Creative Writing serves to remind me to enjoy and appreciate being a writer.

I had a service tech from Current Mechanical here today to determine why my furnace was blowing warm, then cold air. An amiable fellow, we chatted periodically while he worked. About an hour into his ministrations, which included two trips to my roof, he determined that I needed....a new filter. We agreed it was a little embarrassing that neither of us had thought to check the obvious first. But the 4-year old furnace got a good look over, cleaning, and diagnosing. And I promised I wouldn't tell anyone.

Current is one block from Deister and at one point he asked, "Do you take Maumee to work?" But I heard "Do you take mommy to work?" We both had a good laugh over that one.

I know this is a few months late, but I just found where I had jotted these down. Favorite commentator quotes from the Olympics:

"And once again, it was that damned pommel horse." -Al Trautwig, after yet another epic fail on this most treacherous apparatus

"It doesn't matter who stands before a 6'5" Hooker." -Announcer, following a kill by U.S. volleyball player Destinee Hooker

In my initial blog post I talked about my research project being ethnographical. In last Monday's class I realized that it is, more acurately, a learning history. I was previously unfamiliar with this term, but should have been able to intuit it. By interviewing my subject, drawing out her narrative, listening to and recording her stories, we are constructing the story of her life. We are, in effect, learning the history together.

The five salient points about a learning history that Dr. Amidon mentioned describe perfectly what I am learning while undergoing this process:

1.      Storytelling can be valuable.

2.      Different voices can join together to tell a complete narrative.

3.      Research doesn’t end with the final project, but can be reviewed with the participants.

4.      Researchers and subjects come together in a continuing process. (this is currently my favorite part.)

5.      It’s not just studying a culture, but aims to change it for the better.

Okay, I'll admit that I haven't exactly figured out how number 5 comes into play, but am sure it will become clear as my project continues.

There is a scene in the 1981 movie Arthur where he is sitting quietly in the back of his limo, then suddenly says, “Oh!”, throws back his head and begins laughing hysterically. His lady friend asks what’s so funny, to which he replies,"I sometimes just think funny things."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUiCFk2HB94

Sometimes if there isn’t enough laughter in my day, I’ll conjure up a humorous memory and make like Arthur. For instance, the other day I was remembering one very cold winter day on the IU campus when my friend and I came upon a dead squirrel. I picked up its stiff form in my gloved hands and carefully positioned it, in an active pose, in the crook of a tree. That poor thing remained there “running up the tree” until the spring thaw, which gave me the giggles every time I walked by.