Nostalgia Camping

Without my father’s encouragement, I never would have joined Cub Scouts as a child, and then never been a Boy Scout, and thus probably never grown to love camping as much as I do. So it is entirely appropriate, even necessary, that I head out for a roughing-it weekend at least once a year with Dad.

It’s been four years since our last camping trip, and before that it must have been at least two years. As we’ve both gotten older and our lives have changed (he’s retired, I live in Chicago), we’ve had less and less opportunity to pitch a tent, hike all day, eat hobo pies, and toast marshmallows over the pulsing coals of a campfire. But this year, despite our busy schedules (in his retirement, he works part-time for a former retail giant; after quitting a steady high school teaching job, I now work two jobs that keep me busy 24/7), we made the time for a weekend at Yankee Springs State Park in Middleville, Michigan.

My first hike in the woods was probably at Yankee Springs. I grew up in Hastings, which isn’t far from Middleville, and Dad still has, somewhere, a picture he took of me and my sister sitting on a carpet of brown pine needles near smooth trunk of a pine tree; an army-surplus backpack lies open at our feet and I’m holding a half-full bag of potato chips. Anne’s holding a half-full two-liter of Pepsi. In those days, I guess that was Dad’s idea of a good trail snack. I’m not sure exactly where in Yankee Springs Dad took that picture, but I’m sure it was at Yankee Springs, somewhere near Hall Lake, on the Hall Lake Trail, a hiking route Dad and I have trekked many times since, including this past Saturday.

We’ve upgraded our trail food in the years since then. I’ve always got at least two bottles of water and a couple of granola bars with me; Dad carried the trail mix this time. But one thing hasn’t changed: Dad still loves to take pictures. Years ago, he had a Minolta Maxxum 5000 SLR camera with a wide-angle and a telephoto lens. He took that thing everywhere, took pictures of everything: the scenery, his children, other people, his students (he was a sixth-grade teacher and then a principal), and he’d even set the self-timer and get into the frame once or twice himself. But as he got older, the camera got heavier, and I “borrowed” it for a photojournalism class or two in college. He stopped taking so many pictures. In some ways it was a nice break. In others, Dad just wasn’t Dad unless he was snapping pictures of everything that caught his eye.

A few Christmases ago, Anne and I went in on a Kodak digital camera for him: smaller, lighter, and with an almost unlimited capacity for pictures (sure, there’s a limit, but not even Dad takes 200 pictures on one trip). This thing fits in the palm of his hand, and has almost as many settings as his old Minolta (which is now sitting in my closet somewhere). He loves it, and puts it to use at every family function: his grandsons’ birthdays, holidays, when we built a retaining wall around the deck a few years ago, and, of course, whenever we go camping.

During this outing, not only did Dad take pictures of our campsite, our tent, our backpacks as they hung from two trees, various odd-looking trees around our campsite, a family we don’t even know as they fished from a skiff on the lake, but Dad took pictures of me, and of us, in the same spots, in almost the exact same poses, as he did four years ago. For some reason I have yet to figure out, Dad has a special affinity for old, large, many-branched trees that look like something out of The Wizard of Oz. As we passed one such tree, which I recognized as soon as I saw it, our conversation went something like this:

Dad: Let’s get a picture of us near this tree.

Me: You mean just like we did four years ago?

My smile as I said those words started out sardonic, but soon turned cheerful as the shared memory passed between us on the quick and good-natured you-smart-aleck-type-glance that Dad shot me as soon as the words left my mouth. Yes, we had taken pictures near this same tree four years ago. And yes, we’d do it again, because this was a new camping trip, and because taking pictures is what we do on camping trips, and camping is what Dad and I do together.

And when I camp solo, to wilder and rougher places than Yankee Springs, places too far out of the way for Dad these days, I take pictures of my campsite, and my tent, and my pack as it hangs from a tree, and strange-looking trees and vegetation, and every so often, I set the self-timer and get into the frame myself, because I know if Dad were there, that’s the kind of picture he’d take.

Galumphing Through the Week

Final grades are due Wednesday night, so I’m spending each night doing something related to finishing up the semester. Yesterday I graded final exams. Today I graded the final discussion board forums. Tomorrow I’ll do one last check over the grades before I submit them--and I’ll cram too much gear into my external frame pack in preparation for the father-son weekend camping trip, an old summer tradition we’re starting up again after an unfortunate hiatus of a few years.

And in among all of this, the following poem keeps bubbling through my brain. Maybe it’s the Harry Potter influence. Maybe it’s because of my ongoing attempt to memorize it (it shouldn’t be difficult, and yet . . .). Trying to recall the exact order of the stanzas gave me something to do while I was locked out of my apartment last week. In any event, it’s a fun poem, and one I’m certain J.K. Rowling is familiar with. Enjoy.

JABBERWOCKY

Lewis Carroll

(from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, 1872)

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought --
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

No Spoilers Here

I just finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows about 15 minutes ago. I’ve neglected washing, work, and food (but not sleep, though I also tried to neglect that, too) in order to read it, to inhale it, to drink it in with large, satisfied gulps. Reading a book hasn’t been this much fun since I was a kid sitting in front of a box fan on long, hot summer days working my way through a stack of books Mom had brought home from the library for me.

To discuss the book in any great detail would probably give away plot details that I absolutely refuse to divulge, but it should come as no surprise to anyone who has read the previous six Harry Potter novels that Rowling’s foremost strength as a storyteller lies in her ability to construct and maintain an enormously detailed plot that stretches over generations. Every major event in this book, the last of the series, is somehow foreshadowed or touched upon in one of the previous six books. She has created, not just a world and characters that live and breathe and fully come to life in millions of readers’ minds, she has created an intricate and immensely satisfying seven-book storytelling arc.

Anyone who enjoys the kind of arc-driven storytelling that infused works like Buffy the Vampire Slayer or Babylon 5 will relish the way Rowling’s vast scheme unfolds over the course of all seven books. She said in an interview with NPR back in 1998 that she had already written the final chapter of the series, i.e. she had the entire arc planned, at least in outline form. Now the proof is here, and it doesn’t disappoint. That must have been one hell of an outline.

Powerful Addiction

I now own a copy of the seventh and final book in the Harry Potter series, and I’m more excited to read it than I thought I would be, because a good story is like heroin—immediately pleasurable and addictive.

I was never interested in reading any of the Harry Potter books. Boy wizard? Didn’t interest me. Give me Gandalf, the gold standard by which all other wizards should be measured. An orphaned boy with silly glasses and a lightning-bolt-shaped scar on his forehead sounded too cheesy for me to want to read about.

And then, as in so many stories, I met a girl. She didn’t change my mind right away (in fact, I almost dumped her when I saw her collection of every Harry Potter book printed up to that time—in hardcover). But then I discovered a used, beaten-up copy of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone in a box of books given to me for use in my high school classroom, and thought “Hell, since I didn’t have to pay for it, I’ll give it a chance.”

I didn’t like it much. Too juvenile. But seeds had been planted, so I thought I should at least give the second book a chance. I didn’t care much for that one, either, but water had been poured on those seeds, so I gave the third one a try. And that hooked me.

So when I got the “Reserve Your Copy of Harry Potter 7 Now!” email from Amazon a few months ago, I promptly typed in my credit card number and forked over some digital cash. And I never buy hardcover books. I prefer the way a paperback fits in my hands. Also, I’m cheap. But I had to find out what happens to Harry before some inconsiderate asshole spoils the ending for me.

But the copy of what I have so far only read the first chapter of in is not the copy I ordered from Amazon. That copy is still waiting for me in my UPS Store mailbox.

I had to proctor a two-hour final exam for my online students today. At 11 a.m., the time UPS estimated my book would be delivered. And at 2 p.m., I was going to see Mirror of the Invisible World at the Goodman Theater with a friend from work who had free tickets. That didn’t leave me a lot of time to collect my tests, hop on a train, get back to my neighborhood to pick up the book, and get back downtown to the Goodman. Especially after I was a nice guy and let a student who had shown up 45 minutes late stay an extra 45 minutes to finish his test. By the time he was done, I had about 35 minutes to get my book. The UPS Store closes at 5 on Saturdays, and the play was supposed to be two-and-a-half hours long. With my luck, it would run over, and I’d miss my chance to get HP 7 today, fall behind on my scheduled reading, and thus increase the chances of some idiot spoiling the ending for me.

So at 1:30 I stood at the Brown Line platform at State and Lake, waiting for a train. After six minutes, I knew the train was late. I knew my chances of getting my book and getting back to Goodman before 2 were slim to none. I though about bailing on the play, but I love theater, and I had already made plans. But if the play ran as scheduled, I’d probably still have time to get back to the UPS Store before 5. Except with my luck, the show would run late and the Brown Line would break down.

My train pulled up to the station. I had made my decision, but I wasn’t entirely happy: I’d risk missing the play (or being late, which in my mind is even worse) in order to guarantee getting my hands on HP 7 today. I bent over to pick up my backpack, and as I swung it over my left shoulder, I turned right to face the train—and found myself looking at Ana-Luz, my friend with the tickets, who had just gotten off the train I was about to board. Not two feet away from me. Between me and the train that would take me to Harry Potter. I grimaced. I didn’t have time to explain that I’d be late. I’d probably miss the play, but I had to have HP 7. I’d feel guilty and petty, and I hate feeling that way. So I’d be a nice guy and forego my HP gratification. I’d feel anxious and uptight until I had my hands on HP 7, but I didn’t want to look like a dick in front of a friend (although, by my grimace, I probably already did).

Then Ana-Luz pulled the mostly-orange brick of my obsession from her bag. “Here. I didn’t want to feel guilty that you might miss it today,” she said.

I’m an atheist and a pragmatist. I never attribute anything to luck, or fate, or destiny, or God. The world is what it is, and it is shaped by our actions. Nothing else.

But here was, without a doubt, a lucky break.

I was so confounded by this series of coincidences (remember, I was mainly running late because a student of mine had been running late earlier) that, for a moment, I must have seemed angry, because Ana-Luz asked if I was upset. Not upset, I managed to stammer. Just discombobulated. The core of my philosophy of life could not have been more shaken than if God had suddenly appeared before me to say “Hi. You’re wrong.”

I explained all of this to Ana-Luz during the one-block walk to Goodman. She explained that the book had been given to her by another friend who was trying to convert her to Harry-Potterism (“So why start with the last book?” I asked. “Oh, he got me the first one, too,” she answered. “Still strange,” I said. “Yeah,” she answered.) I successfully managed not to read the book during the play. I waited until several hours later, back on the L, headed for home.

When I pulled Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows out of my backpack, I felt like Indiana Jones unearthing the Ark of the Covenant. It seemed to glow. I felt the mass of it in my hands, and I don’t just mean its physical weight. I had known for weeks what the cover would look like. I had seen two people reading the book at the Brown Line stop while I struggled with my earlier ethical decision about ditching a friend. I had even felt it in my hands hours earlier, when Ana-Luz had given me this copy. But now, as I pulled the book from my bag, knowing that this time I was going to actually open and read it, it seemed as though I could not only feel the cardboard and paper that the book was made of, but feel the heft of the story within, pulsing between the covers like a living thing.

Because that’s what story is—life.

The power of story is a recurring theme in the works of Neil Gaiman and Dan Simmons and just about every other author I admire. It was the theme of the play I had just seen. Story is the beauty that never fades , the treasure that never loses value. It is the only thing humans can create that even has a chance of being eternal. And for atheists like me, it is the only eternal thing. Story. Narrative. Tales that tell of fanciful exploits and daring loves, horrors beyond imagining and beauty that rends the heart. Harry Potter may not be the most finely-crafted literature in the English language. It will never be placed in the canon beside such monumental works as King Lear or Anna Karenina or The Old Man and the Sea or Madame Bovary. It has no such pretensions. J.K. Rowling just wanted to tell a tale that meant something to her and that might mean something to others. In that, she was successful. The books hit all the major clichés of a successful story: the characters come to life, the plot is both twisting and cohesive, the world comes to life. These elements of the story stay with the reader, with me, long after the last page is read and we move on to another book. A good story is as addictive as heroin, and (I’m guessing here) pleasurable for many of the same reasons. We read and are transported, taken out of ourselves, and yet a good story grounds us in ourselves as nothing else can.

A long-time fantasy fan (I read The Lord of the Rings when I was something like 10 years old and haven’t been the same since), I have recently started struggling with wanting to feel less frivolous in my reading, and so I read more non-fiction, like Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States, Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, Henry David Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience, Huston Smith’s The World’s Religions, Thich Nhat Hanh’s The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching, Reza Aslan’s No God But God. Serious books about serious things, college-reading-list types of books, books that address real concerns in the real world, political philosophies and spiritual truths.

But just often, although in a different way, a good story can teach me—affect me—just as much. So now I’m going to finish reading Harry Potter.

It's Live! Live, I Tell You!

It probably goes without saying that a world-class city like Chicago always has something to offer. It has two major-league baseball teams, one major-league football team, several highly-regarded museums, more than a handful of historic sites, numerous fantastic attractions, and a wide assortment of restaurants and nightclubs.

I’m probably most fond of the local public radio station, especially the locally-produced and nationally-recognized shows, like This American Life and Wait, Wait . . . Don’t Tell Me! Once I finally got around to discovering podcasts, I’ve been downloading and time-shifting these shows every week. I’ve even been fortunate enough to catch a live taping of TAL (episode #328: What I Learned from TV) and several tapings of Wait, Wait—like the free show in Millennium Park I attended tonight.

The free-and-in-Millennium-Park part was only one (OK, two) reasons this show was special. The third reason was the guest for the “Not My Job” segment—United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois Patrick Fitzgerald. You know, the special prosecutor in the Valerie Plame identity leak case; the guy who got I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby convicted of lying to prosecutors during that investigation (and then, of course, President Bush swooped in and bailed out his loyal henchman, but more on that later).

Fitzgerald rarely gives interviews, so his appearance on the show was something of a coup for the Wait, Wait crew, something host Peter Sagal made a point of mentioning, albeit in is usual humorously self-deprecating manner. Before the show started, he told this (paraphrased) anecdote about talking with Fitzgerald back stage:

I was talking with Mr. Fitzgerald back stage, and told him that his public appearance was so rare that a reporter called me up to ask me about it. I explained [to the reporter] what Fitzgerald would be doing on the show, and the reporter asked me what I was going to ask him. I explained that we like to keep the “Not My Job” questions a secret, since we like to surprise the guest with them, but the reporter explained, “It’s OK, I’m writing a story that won’t come out until after the show is broadcast.” So I told him. At which point Mr. Fitzgerald looked at me rather archly and said “So you leaked.”

And then I had to change my pants.

The best joke of this entirely excellent show, however, came about halfway through the taping, once Fitzgerald was actually on the stage. After quickly getting the obvious question out of the way (“Who leaked Valerie Plame’s identity?” at which Fitzgerald only chuckled), Sagal continued with some relaxing banter, inquiring into Fitzgerald’s past jobs (he once worked as a doorman and a janitor, and said it was easier being a janitor), past prosecutorial successes, and the fact that he now lives in Chicago.

Peter Sagal: We hear you live on the north side.

Patrick Fitzgerald: Yes.

Peter Sagal: But you work downtown.

Patrick Fitzgerald: Yes.

Peter Sagal: So, how do you feel about . . . commuting?

I am ashamed to confess it took me about ten seconds longer to get that joke than it should have (I blame Sagal’s completely deadpan delivery), but once I got it, I was howling along with the rest of the crowd.

And yes, the scooter jokes flew fast and thick every moment Fitzgerald was on stage. And if you want to hear them all, I suggest listening to the broadcast of Wait, Wait on your local public radio station, or you can go to iTunes and sign up for the weekly podcast (which you should do anyway—you’ll laugh and learn a thing or two about the state of the world. Nothing that’s really useful, but still).

The last reason you should listen to this show is because I was there. And if you listen carefully, you might even pick out my cackling all the way from the back row of the Jay Pritzker Pavillion in Millennium Park in downtown Chicago (Richard M. Daley, Mayor).

Getting to Know the Neighbors

For a few years when I lived in Lansing, I would sometimes work for my friend Mark, a journeyman contractor. He’d get a job to, for example, re-do someone’s basement bathroom, and he and I would show up, armed with drill drivers and nail guns, and proceed to tear everything out of the old bathroom, re-route the plumbing, re-wire the fixtures, frame and drywall the room, then sand, paint, and viola! new bathroom.

Since he was a pro and I was merely a professional helper, Mark always handled the actual plumbing and electrical work. I got to run the nail gun sometimes, but that was about as advanced as I got. I’m certain that at some point, Mark pointed out to me that these days, most major electrical appliances, refrigerator, air conditioner, water heater, etc, get their own circuit in the breaker box.

Not, apparently, in my apartment.

The building I live in was originally built sometime around the beginning of the 20^th century. The interior has been updated throughout the years, but it still leaves a little be desired. Floors that cant to the middle of the room are the most obvious drawback of my domicile. Blowing a fuse almost every time I use my air conditioner is another. The A/C itself can run OK, but if I want to use a fan or two to help circulate the colder air, the A/C and everything in my kitchen—the fridge, the microwave—will eventually draw too much power and flip the breaker.

Oh, and did I mention that the breaker boxes for all four apartments that have been carved out of this house are in a tiny, closet-like room accessible only from outside the building? Consider it mentioned. This means every time I blow a fuse, I have to put on shoes, walk about forty feet along the outside of the building, unlatch the wooden door to the breaker closet (imagine the latch on an old screen door; you know, the kind with a hook that fits into an eyebolt?), and find the breaker that’s been flipped.

This isn’t usually such a big deal. Sure, the last time it happened, I was pretty sure I spooked a rat or something that had made a home in amongst the many autumns’ worth of dead leaves that have piled up around the roofing paper, old broom, and other miscellaneous junk that’s kept in there (the door doesn’t come all the way to the ground, making access incredibly easy for small animals), and the first time I blew a fuse, I had to flip switches in each of the four breaker boxes because none of them are labeled. So re-setting my breakers has gotten kind of routine. So routine that I walked out of my apartment rather exasperated—and forgot to grab my keys.

Yep. I locked myself out of my apartment, something I haven’t done since college. And heavy gray storm clouds were moving slowly across the sky, like a hungry bear stalking its dinner. Me.

Those of you who know me will not be surprised that as soon as I realized what I had done, the first word out of my mouth was one that begins with an “f.” Those of you who know me will also be surprised that the very next thing I did was laugh. Loudly. I kept laughing for a good five minutes. What else was I gonna do?

After my short burst of absurdist mirth, I took stock. Did I have a spare key? Yes I did. In my apartment. Could I get in through a window? No, I had been running my air conditioner and all of my windows were closed and locked. Were any of my neighbors home? Elizabeth who lives above me? Nope. Rachelle who lives behind and above me? Nope. Lupe or her husband, who live directly behind me? Bingo!

I only knew Lupe and Juan through their gas bill. It had been delivered to me by mistake shortly after they moved in, so I hand-delivered it to Juan. “Hi, here’s your gas bill, it was in my mailbox.” “Thanks.” That was about the extent of my conversation with Juan.

But Lupe was very helpful. She had the maintenance guy’s number in her cell phone, dialed him for me, gave me a glass of water while I waited for him to show up. We chatted about the gas bill (which unfortunately in the winter tends to be rather large for an apartment in a house that is about 100 years old—I suspect from lack of insulation), and the hassles of parking in the street.

Half an hour later, about an hour after I had locked myself out of my apartment, Brian showed up and let me in.

“Don’t feel bad,” he said. “Elizabeth’s had to call me at least three times.”

I Killed My Television

I haven’t watched television regularly since December of last year. When I moved into my new apartment that month, I thought I’d save a little cash by not hooking up cable TV. Since I can get the only two TV shows I watched regularly through iTunes, anyway, it wasn’t much of a sacrifice. And I haven’t missed it since.

It would have been easy to get cable TV hooked up. After all, I needed cable internet to be able to effectively teach my online composition courses. That costs me $60 a month, and TV only would have been an extra $40. It was tempting. I have never not been without TV. I don’t think many of us have. That damned cyclopean glass eye is in almost every living room, family room, kitchen, and bedroom in the country.

A number of things held be back, however. First, there was the money. I was only saving $40 a month, but $40 is $40, especially when I knew I would almost never be home to watch the TV I would be paying for. I might have spent the $40 if I’d had a TiVo (and not one of the vastly inferior DVRs that Comcast could provide), but the TiVo I used to have belonged to the ex, so no time-shifting for me. Third, I could actually time-shift the only two shows on television I care about these days, now that anything and everything created by Joss Whedon and/or Tim Minear is off the air; The Daily Show and The Colbert Report are both available through iTunes, for about $20 a month combined, and I can take them on my iPod and watch them during my train ride to work every morning. In the end, it was easy to kill my TV.

The television set itself is still in one piece, actually. It even still works. I needed it for a while to watch movies on. I killed cable, but not my Netflix queue (although I did dial that down to one movie at a time, limit two a month). And after I got a new wide-screen laptop with an absolutely gorgeous screen resolution, I watch movies on that. But I most emphatically do not watch regular television anymore. No slanted cable news, no stupid sitcoms, no shows I love canceled because network execs didn’t get it. I get my news from NPR and the Associated Press (via Yahoo). I get my laughs from The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. I have my favorite movies and TV shows on DVD. I read books. Non-fiction, even. I don’t need television, and I don’t miss it at all.

Summer Job

I spent the summers of my teen years mowing lawns: $5 a pop for the small ones, $10 a pop for the larger ones. I was the Official Peach Street Lawnmower Man, or I would have been, had Peach been more of a street and less of a packed-dirt rut that connected Harbert Road and Red Arrow Highway. Back then, having a summer job meant independence (I got to drive Dad’s Ford Escort station wagon all by myself once I turned 16—I could fit the push lawnmower in the back) and, of course, money. I mowed a lawn, I got cash, half of which Dad insisted I put in savings. I hated it at the time, but when I finally went to college and had enough for a Macintosh LC, it all seemed worth it. But the feeling of independence the summer job gave me was paramount.

I haven’t felt the same about a summer job since.

In college I had a motley assortment of summer jobs: doing morning delivery for a bakery, working as an office peon for the Central Michigan University Health Sciences Department, stocking shelves and helping customers as a sporting goods associate at Meijer, helping maintain one of the safety systems at a nuclear power plant (it wasn’t nearly as glamorous as it might sound, or as dangerous). Some of the jobs were cool (the nuclear plant), some were hellish (I had to be to the bakery by 4 a.m. every day), but they were all means to an end—getting out of college and getting a real job.

The problem was, I didn’t really want a real job. I would have been perfectly happy as a professional student, and I prolonged college as long as I could by sticking around an extra there years to get my MA in English Language and Literature (had I been serious at all about finding a real job, I would have gotten some other kind of degree).

Random Person: “So, what’s your degree in?”

Me: “English.”

Random Person: “Oh. So you gonna teach in high school?”

Me: “Hell no. I hated high school the first time through. Why would I want to go back?’

But, the job market being what it is for someone with a degree in English, I eventually did get my high school teaching certification. The number one reason I decided setting foot in high school again wouldn’t be so bad: I’d get my summers off.

Granted, that’s one of the worst reasons to become a teacher. Teaching is about so much more than getting two or three months of free time in the summer. But I’m a die-hard outdoorsman, and the prospect of spending weeks out in the wilderness without having to coordinate with some corporate vacation schedule (or spending years accumulating enough vacation time to take the kinds of long trips I had in mind) was vastly appealing.

If you’ve been reading this blog, you know the rest of the story. I enjoyed my one summer off while it lasted, but since I didn’t know at the time that it would be my last summer off, I hardly made the most of it. After the hell that had been my first year of teaching, I figured I had earned the right to slack off for a few months.

And now I work a full-time (although temporary) job for a corporation, and while I have managed to finesse my summer hours so I work more in June in July in order to get every Friday in August off, I know it won’t be the same as having my entire summer to myself.

I do sometimes regret walking out on my students and fellow teachers halfway through my second school year. I let a lot of people down. On the upside, I saved my sanity. I’m much calmer and more relaxed these days. I don’t come home from a day of proofreading, for example, and immediately drink two glasses of strong red wine.

But on summer days when the air is warm and dry, when the sky is brilliant blue and smudged here and there with the white cotton of cumulus congestus, when the trees are replete with leaves and lawns are vibrantly verdant—on days like that, I wish I still had my summers off.

All the same, however, I’d rather have my sanity.

Re-crossing a Metaphorical Styx

I’m alive.

I thought it necessary to begin that way because, as I have discovered after these many, many, months of not posting to this blog, I have a fan base. A tiny fan base made up mostly of my immediate family and a few close friends, but it’s a start. And, like fans everywhere, these people want to know when I’m going to start writing again, specifically, when I’m going to start writing in this blog again. Apparently, some of them need one more thing to distract them at work.

Therefore: I’m alive. And since I have realized that I am, indeed, alive, and have spent the past several months getting used to that idea, I now find that every so often I have something to say, or, more to the point, write. However, since I am a world-class procrastinator (having been given the rank of “Expert” by the World Procrastinator’s Society; or, at least, I will be given that rank when they finally get around to forming said society), I can always find a reason and/ or a way to put off writing. But if I can motivate myself to wake up at 5 a.m. every morning to do yoga and tai chi before going to work, if I can motivate myself to stay awake while proofreading what seems to be the same math textbook over and over and over again for up to eight hours a day, and if—most amazingly—I can motivate myself to run a little over three miles when I get home from work, if I can find the motivation to do all of these things, surely I can find the motivation to write.

And now, having used up my writerly motivation for the day, I will close this post, pick up my copy of Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States, and read for about 30 minutes before falling asleep. I wrote much more than this, but it’s in terribly rough shape, and I don’t have time to clean it up and make it presentable, as I have a 5 a.m. date with the Yang style short tai chi form, but rest assured, fans: more is coming.