Luv Ya Bunches!

The following is a review I wrote up for Lauren Myracle's book, Luv Ya Bunches. It's part of a series entitled "Where Are the Gay Parents in YA?" hosted on http://krisasselin.blogspot.com/. Look there for more info and some excellent books in the field! 

From Lauren Myracle regarding her first installment of the "Flower Power" series:

“A child having same-sex parents is not offensive, in my mind, and shouldn’t be ‘cleaned up.’… Over 200,000 kids in America are raised by same-sex parents, just like Milla. It’s not an issue to clean up or hide away… In my opinion, it’s not an ‘issue’ at all. The issue, as I see it, is that kids benefit hugely from seeing themselves reflected positively in the books they read. It’s an extremely empowering and validating experience.”

After trolling through the internet, searching for a good YA book with gay parents, this quote struck me. In October of 2009, Scholastic threatened to ban her tween novel, Luv Ya Bunches, from its book fairs. Its complaints? Language (instances of "geez," "crap," and "[oh my] God"). . . and Camilla's parents. Camilla, one of the four protagonists, has two moms, Mom Abigail and Mom Joyce. So, I sought to find out just what kind of objectionable portrayal Myracle had wrought in this novel.

When the book arrived at the Post Office in a package from Amazon - (unrelated, but) along with The Scrapbook of Frankie Pratt and Marisol - my jaw dropped. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but 335 pages of flower power was not it.

"Oh, Gosh," I thought to myself (lest Scholastic censor this review for language). I was willing to commit to 150 pages of goofy tween drama, but 300+? Ay. All the same, I curled up on the sofa and opened to the first orange, swirly-curly flowery page. Some four hours later, I turned to the last orange, swirly-curly flowery page. As is Myracle's trademark, the writing not so much compels as gale-force-wind whirls you through it. Much of the novel is IM, or takes place on the "Flower Box" chat platform that Yasaman, one of the four, creates. This internet narrative, as well as the school scenes, were initially baffling to me. 

I teach high school English on a Pueblo reservation in New Mexico; my housemate teaches fifth grade. Though many of our students are avid texters, the virtual reality seemed utterly alien to reservation life. The privilege - Katie-Rose with her new yellow camera, the liberty of classroom instruction with the Potato Olympics, all four girls with their bedroom PCs - was odd and read as unrealistic. All the same, I kept reading. And despite the trite facade of these girls' lives, I found there were very real issues at work.

The best quality of the book, however, was that these real-world problems NEVER demand whole-hearted attention. To a critic, this could be criticized as trivializing these themes. I think, however, Myracle does a lovely job of normalizing. In fact, this is normalization at its best. As her above quote reflects, she is clearly seeking to empower her readers. Instead of puffs from publishers or professional reviewers, she has quotes posted on her website from tween readers. 

A look at the four flower girls:

Yasaman comes from a very traditional Turkish family. She wears a hijab and fears her kindergarten-age sister Nigar will be teased. At the same time, Yasaman is a computer whiz and has designed the very cool BlahBlahSomethingSomething.com. Never fear, as the fabulous four come together, it is renamed luvyabunches.com. (check it out!)

Katie-Rose is half Chinese, half Anglo. She is the videoing whiz, has a quick quirky wit, and is widely regarded as an eccentric nerd. 

Violet is the African American new girl. Her family moved to California so they could be close to her mother, who is in a mental institution. 

And Camilla, who at the beginning of the novel is wildly popular, but can't decide whether she likes her queen bee compadres. She also has two moms.

With a cast like this, the text could easily be bogged down by the melodrama and hurt of prejudice based on: race, ethnicity, religion, sexuality, and mental illness. But for these girls, while their differences aren't ignored, the main conflict is finding Camilla's Tally the Turtle and thwarting the mean queen bee Modessa. Myracle chooses, rather than having her protagonists struggle against larger issues of homophobia or racism, affirm acceptance by having their differences lead to a far stronger result. Separate, they are all lorded over by Modessa and Quin. Together, they are - at least by 5th-grade standards - UNSTOPPABLE.

As you can see, this book is a highly offensive piece of smut. 

A closer look on how artfully Myracle handles Camilla's two mothers. Mostly, the references are a kid's to a parent. Mom will pick her up, give her advice in the car, Mom Abigail and Mom Joyce gave her her beloved Guatemalan bobble-head wooden turtle, Tally. Her friends ask casually about her moms in the some way someone would ask a question of any parents. 

There are only two instances of the book where Milla reflects on her lesbian moms. The first is on page 55, when Milla is experiencing inner turmoil about her summer friendship with Katie-Rose (the "weirdo") and her school identity as a Mean Girl. She thinks, "Sometimes Milla feels different from the other girls at school because of having two moms. Sometimes MIlla feels different from her two moms because of being. . . well, just a plain old normal girl, the sort who would rather be the same as everyone else than different." The first sentence is one of occasional alienation, but the next idea is admiration of her mothers. Here are strong women who aren't afraid to be themselves!

The second is on page 255 when Milla and Mom Joyce are driving to school in her convertible:

"Getting caught in rainstorms and having to put the top up are two of the many reasons Mom Abigail teases Mom Joyce about owning a convertible. Mom Joyce counters that Mom Abigail is a soccer mom in her bright red minivan, which isn't true, because Milla doesn't play soccer. She takes dance. 

But Mom Abigail says pff to mom Joyce's soccer mom comments, reminding Mom Joyce that a minivan is exactly what she needs for her catering business. 'Anyway, I love my bright red minivan,' Mom Abigail says breezily. 'It reminds me of cherries.' 

Her moms are so different - and yet they fit together perfectly.

Just like people can be different and still be friends, Milla thinks. They can be different and still. . . click."

Luv Ya Bunches is not a Newberry Honor Book. It does not transcend issues or shift paradigms in artful prose. What it does, however, is capture beautifully the nature of what friendship and love should look like in America today. It's a fast, easy read that has aesthetic and narrative appeal to kids both younger and older than our fictional heroines. For girls (and boys, given context) struggling with difference, it's ideal. It is a book that teaches us to not make assumptions (about a person or the caliber of a book by its cover). It also teaches us, through Milla's moms, that differences make us stronger. 

What a Week!

It's a sunny day in Zuni land!


To be fair, 95% of the time it is a sunny day in Zuni land. It seems the earth is finally catching up with the skies, for it feels like summer: a street ball tournament at the nearby playground, our little garden growing, the breeze in the 70s, and even a handful of little leggy yellow flowers peering upwards towards our living room window.


I have two weeks left of the school year, which seem as unbelievable as the fact that I still have 9 days left to teach. It's May NINETEENTH, which seems impossibly late in the year. It's hard to figure out what seems more surreal - the fact that a year ago last Wednesday, I was spraying champagne at my fellow class of 2011, dancing on tables and living, for the afternoon, carefree . . . or the fact that last Wednesday, I was celebrating Native American Day at my school, speaking broken Zuni and watching my students perform the deer dance and living, for the day, carefree.


Another bit of cognitive dissonance came with our periodic CC alumni newsletter:

Of course, it's not the CC garden today. . . it's the CC garden almost 2 years ago. I'd like to defend my (anonymous) position in the newsletter, however, to say that if they saw our backyard, they wouldn't be too disappointed: a chicken run for which I dug the posts and strung up the wire, a chicken coop crafted from a dog house, cabbage, peppers, tomatoes (numbering 27 plants total) each planted in their separate waffle plot, a 3-sisters garden in potentia, and the beginnings of a raised bed for potatoes.

But enough about plants.

To the week: 

First off, I had NWEA testing MT-TF this week, so it was the after school schedule largely that was so demanding.

MONDAY: I presented at the School Board Meeting to try to get a drama class / 2 productions approved for the coming year. I was petrified; people make the false assumption that because my major was in the performing arts, and since I corral 100-some kids every day, I would be not nervous in situations like this. Incorrect! That being said, I do believe my presentation went well. I don't remember much, other than that I went into "I-Love-Theatre Dreamland." I remember twining my fingers together and speaking of the cultural relevance and richness to theatre. The board was thrilled, I am happy to report. When I was defining dramaturgy (the course is a semester survey in history, performance, and technical theatre), I used for example a production concept of doing Our Town in 19th century Zuni. They grew agog and smiling at this, trying to find ways to get me funding and help with the course. It was unanimously approved! As was my colleague's forensics course. 

All this, I may add, after the chair of my department opened the school board meeting by not-so-subtly telling the board to NOT approve our courses. She cited finances and the irrelevance of it. Too bad it's cost-neutral and wildly relevant. Needless to say, a big battle this week has been trying to be kind to her.

TUESDAY: Two words: Sports Banquet. Again, fighting the odds, we had another successful evening. They put me at the end of the coach's long table, so I sat next to no one and across from the Ranch dress - no matter! They forgot to print my non-lettering girls' certificates - no matter, I'll take the time for supper to print my own. They put the wrong girl's name on my Most Spirited award - oh, geez, I guess I'll just make a joke to poor L.L. and get it fixed tomorrow. But on the bright side, I made the crowd laugh pretty uproariously when I retold my story of becoming the cheer coach. (". . . and they said, 'Will you please be our cheer coach? and I said, '. . . sure?'") 6-9pm. But there were cheese enchiladas!

WEDNESDAY: As I've mentioned, my Native American Day was a blast. Instead of showcasing my fearsome sunburn, I'll show this:

1-3 periods were my ever-popular Nature walks. I began first with a little blurb about my culture - a tough enough job, in my entitled culture of power / Western European mutts, which I communicated to them. I did, however, wear my mother's feedsack dress that my grandmother had made for her at the end of the 1950s. 1. I look more than a little cute in it and 2. I could say, "it represents a culture that wasted as little as possible and had a deep connection to the earth." These values, I know transfer through to this culture. . . generally, it was a lovely segue into nature + book talk: "in my family's culture, the two most precious things you can give someone are an appreciation for nature and appreciation for the written word as a means to understand and change art and the world."

Then, I gave them the middle handout. I bet you have NEVER handed out a similar sheet. On it, painstakingly searched in a dictionary and run by my savant student En.T., are a list of local plants and critters in Zuni. I set them loose - suffice it to say, by the end of third hour, I knew more of the words than a good deal of the students. My thrilling COMPLETE sentence I can say in Zuni: Ho' k'ets'iłdo t'sana u:lakkya. (I saw a small cricket.)

5th hour we met up with Iralu's class and traipsed to the Eagle Sanctuary. Yes, we have an Eagle Sanctuary full of golden & bald eagles within walking distance. Don't you? The speaker was obsessed with us knowing every facet of these birds - including the coloration of the pinion feathers of the juvenile birds - but was quite knowledgable. Standing in the sweltering in my off-the-shoulders dress (reader, here is where the sunburn enters), I would've preferred more time actually studying the birds. All the same, it's a really cool project - the Zuni traditionally practiced eagle husbandry, and so they're bringing that back with non-releasable birds given to them from the US Department of Fish and Wildlife (as opposed to euthanasia). The rest of the day was watching our students, in full regalia, doing their social dance performances and presenting the Zuni Native Ambassadors for the following school year. If you're interested in what the dance clothing looked like, these aren't my students (obviously), but the costumes are the same: (buffalo dance) https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfEXFVm_y8_2JYH8fCVFQS4SPITxznjy3o3ErMJRiwrFeoYfgCztyPJSAMWTnUeRMAEr-oRBxxMHCaNlVn5lgzAYu-4DooWp3BJBzatMU9UDLHTx7MNSyzPZNoIWSkLcLmkNtbG7ChTIU/s1600/IMG_9686.JPG and (deer dance) http://blankinship-web.com/intertribal/Zuni_Deer_Dance_017.jpg.

When the bell rang for the end of the day, they all processed down the hall, the deer dancers moving their heads in the uncanny way of seeming actually animal. In their wake were the drummers and proud parents. I took a picture with my cellphone. If it hadn't been so blurry, I think I would've sent it to a few friends with the message: "how we end every school day in Zuni Pueblo."

THURSDAY: I judged 8 5th-grade portfolios. Enough said. It was delightful! AND we got fed chips + delicious salsa and a GIANT bowl of guacamole. YUM. Of the presentations, most were alternately sweet, impressive, fidgety, moving, and adorable. I got home, again, about 9pm. I sat on the porch steps in the dark, processing that sweet early summer air.

I've already been writing more than I've intended to, so I'll leave off fairly soon. But first, the mandatory book update:

I finished Geography of the Heart. It was my birthday gift from Ms. Lyl, and it was exactly the moving portrait of love and loss I hoped it would be. For a great blurb from NPR: http://www.npr.org/2012/03/29/146866399/love-isnt-all-you-need-3-relationship-building-reads. I'm plowing through The (delightful) Hobbit, which my sophomores are ACTUALLY reading and ACTUALLY enjoying. Some fun monomyth / archetype study about heroes! And, as of today (and on the recommendation of my Indiana Read judge father), I'm more than halfway through A Girl Named Zippy. Talk about a delight of reflection, pith, and general Hoosier affection! I heartily recommend it for anyone in need of a laugh, a think, or a reconsideration of small-town, Midwest life. Ina May's Spiritual Midwifery continues to be a nice bedtime read.

On that note, both the prenatal group moderating doctors at the Zuni Hospital are thrilled at the prospect of having a doula  attend / help out / etc. Alllllllll right!

And, to wrap up this monolith of a week, another "you know you live in Zuni when:"

You pet sit for three periods when a student / cheerleader brings you a kitten she found abandoned that morning. Some cute pix to thank you for reading this far:

Over and out ~

Commitment

Today, while my students were watching part of the (odious) 1932 version of A Farewell to Arms, I looked around at my 7th hour. They were watching intently, some annotating their Venn diagram of novel vs. film. One student was fighting sleep, until Catherine whopped Frederic across the face and everyone laughed at the overblown sound effects. I was then reminded of a quote from someone while I was visiting up in Colorado Springs for spring break. I was telling her (I think it was a her?) about TFA, and she said, "Oh, it's two years?"

I replied, "Yeah. It's two years - but you can stay longer if you want to."

"Wow," she said, "That's a big commitment."

Geez, it is. I am realizing it more and more. Far more than a big commitment to myself, it is such a commitment to a region, to a kid, to a people. But, looking at them, who wouldn't try to give them your absolute best? Your absolute, absolute best?

 Lest you think I am going soft in the head or being undone by sap:

* Today I said, "you are wasting time with your talking of stupidity!"

* Today I said, "ew. stop playing ear footsie or whatever the heck that is."

* Today I put the following picture on their vocab powerpoint:

(it was the perfect example of decoy! to be fair, I did say: "you objectify women, this is what happens!")
* Today we just named our toaster Tea Cake, due to his endearing, yet occasionally histrionic (read: hydrophobic) behavior

Okay, phew! Now I feel entitled to enjoy a little more sweetness and light.

First, I got to see some of my cheer girls after school. I have to do uniform inventory and was having them vote for Team Awards. It was delightful to see them as an excited, enthusiastic group. I heard several "I miss cheerleading!"s and I was glad to feel a similar sentiment. I am happy to coach again next year, but I had been dreading the time commitment. Again, I realize this is a commitment I am bound and happy to make.

Journalism was an excited mess. Let the record show that for the final issue, my kids wanted to write two articles (as opposed to one). I said, "How will we make this work?" And one of my editors said, "We should make a mega big 16-pager." The class cheered.

Finally, Ninja Doula is back again! One of my students is out on maternity leave, and the paper came requesting the work for her "homebound status." I had thought about this before, and so, instead of trying to paraphrase the lessons we are doing in class, I took the same objectives (writing to invoke emotion and crafting a research paper) and applied them differently. Here is the cover letter:

Hello, A____!

I hope you are having the most beautiful time with little Ryan Alexander. J

I know your first priority is on your little one, so my makeup work is focused on the same topic.

The two things I would like you to do:

·       I would like you to keep a journal of your baby’s first days. First, write an account of the birth: what you remember, what you’d like to share with Ryan when he’s old enough. Write a little every day: how are you feeling, what new things have you noticed / is he doing, what are your thoughts about being a mother or being you or whatever? Ideally, you’ll continue this journal the whole first year – or beyond! J (I will only check this off. It is, of course, yours to keep.)

·       Read the attached articles. They are from Peaceful Parenting websites, which promotes gentle mothering and disagrees with some popular ideas in our culture. After reading all of them, write a reflection paper on what you liked and / or disliked and / or have more questions about. Make sure to address: What is the birth culture in the US / Zuni? Also, how do you feel about self-soothing, breastfeeding, co-sleeping, and even babywearing?

Let me know if you have any questions, comments, concerns: 765-376-5786.

Come back to school when you are ready. You’re embarking on a big, lifelong journey, so make sure you have your foundation when you return. We miss you in class! J

Sincerely,

Ms. H.

Attached, then, was a 9-page packet of the benefits (including, of course, copious amounts from Meredith Small's Our Babies, Ourselves) of these different practices. 

This reminds me of a paper I've written recently in my Issues in Secondary Ed class. Right. Am I allowed to say I have been SWAMPED from my three classes at UNM this semester? It's been manageable, but really only barely. Anywho, sometimes I'm allowed to really explore my passions with teaching. First, it was a 10-pager on the benefits of theatre in the ELA classroom (entitled "Those Glee Kids Must Be On To Something") and now "Hush Little Baby: an inquiry into student mothers and an educator's dearth of resources." Largely, I wrote about exactly that - how there are myriad pregnancy prevention programs (as there should be!), but very little prescriptive guidance for teenage mothers. This is an excerpt from the paper:

What I want to do – and have talked to the school nurse and need to start talking to my moms about – is get them to start an advocacy group for young parents at Zuni High School. I know they are frustrated and tired so much of the time, and I think it may take an organized effort on their behalf to secure the rights they are properly deserving of under Title 9. They should fight for a longer maternity leave, alternative schedules, and, most of all, recognition by the faculty. Schoolwide policy should guarantee these students such accomodations (not modifications). I feel too often the attitude is “it’s their problem and their responsibility.” It’s funny that in one sentence, such educators can denigrate their students as “children” and then, apparently, “responsible” adults. Young parents are forced to straddle a strange, liminal space between childhood and adulthood.

            How I can begin, then, is by renewing my commitment to my mothers (and fathers). Some mothers are on top of their game, but most I find highly capable writers (above average) but highly overwhelmed. It will do them no good to pity her and drop assignments / grade too easily just as it does no good to treat her as a student with the average number of commitments. I need to make sure I’m helping them figure out a time to do schoolwork, timelines for turning work in late (planned before a  large assignment is due), or alternative projects if need be. I want to make sure, especially in Native communities where young motherhood is so prevalent (and not necessarily unusual), that those students have the resources and rights they should.

There it is again, that powerful word.
Yes, it seems I'm committed.

Ninja Doula!

. . . I'm not so sure what Rush Limbaugh would make of me. I'm hoping for "scarlet woman" because "slut" is so last week. We were comparing HD's "Pear Tree" and the symbol of Janie's nascent sexuality in Their Eyes Were Watching God, Sir, nothing funny about women's rights. Off to the right is a diagram of a Greek theatre for my 5th block class; let's talk about society-ordained condemnation of women!


But, seriously, hello! I'm sorry for my poor writerly habits; I suppose I'm going to play the I'm-a-first-year-teacher-with-3-UNM-classes-and-just-finished-coaching card. I've been journaling better the past week or so, and I'm glad Res to Rez followed suit.  It's a Friday, and Checkers and I look roughly like this:

It's more than impossible to summarize two months of teaching and craziness and such, so I'll just provide a snapshot or two.

FIRST, my literary snapshot. Yesterday I finished Feed, the devastating technocratic dystopia by MT Anderson. Well written? Yes. Enjoyable? No. Anderson captures the voice of a "null bro" at the end of the 21st century, and very likely the end of the world. The YA novel hits a little too close to home (especially having read about the "Google glasses" and the new iDoodad in the past week); the America of the future is one where the majority of Americans have chips implanted in their brains that broadcasts their "feed," or personalized internet stream. Think of it as Star Girl meets Fahrenheit 451 meets The Oresteia. The setting is Bradburyian, the characters / symbolism is Aeschylus, and Star Girl is Cassandra. Dang it!

For an even more riveting read that's less like a proverbial curb stomp? The Hunger Games. Yes, what they said is true. They are well written, the premise is disturbing and beautifully-imagined, yet the Romantic aesthetic of nature and pure emotion still has a prominent role (it is obliterated in Feed). Let's just say my grading, sleep, teaching, coaching, homework, and social skills suffered the 5 days in which it took me to read the trilogy. They come STRONGLY recommended.

My current baby reading is Ina May's Spiritual Midwifery. Classic, groovy, and great! I'm enjoying the birthing stories, rife with rushes and smooches and spiritual highs, but especially look forward to the advice for parents and midwives section. However, I came across two other FABirth reads, and where else but in the biblio-Mecca of Gallup Goodwill? (The best part of the past sentence is that I'm completely serious) The first is simply called Midwife by Jennifer Worth; it is a memoir about her experiences as a midwife with the House of Nonnatus (yes, midwife nuns) in the impoverished East End of London in the 1950s. Compellingly written, but the stories are the true incredible portion. It pushes no agenda, but makes a strong gentle birth message just by recounting her history. I also just finished Catherine Taylor's Giving Birth. Also great! It was made sweller by taking place in New Mexico, where Taylor herself lives. She very meticulously wove together field experience, her own doula training, research, and her own second pregnancy. It's a very satisfying read that tracks her own dawning self awareness as a powerful being in agency of her own body.

SECOND, my cheerleading snapshot? My girls' season wrapped up beautifully, and all had a lovely time at our supper at Chu-Chu's. They also produced this for homecoming: http://youtu.be/16SWObNNw-c . Yes, I know they're wonderful.

THIRD, my UNM snapshot. Cor. Overwhelmed. I got a bit behind when I missed a couple of classes for cheerleading and coaching / judging at the State Speech and Debate meet in Santa Fe two weeks ago (that's a whole story within itself), so I have 9 assignments for ONE of my classes. 2 assignments for another, and 2 for the third. Um, ridiculous? Qué sí.

***

But my true reason for writing - the namesake of my article - is this:

First, OMG am I cute or what?? Kidding, but I was thrilled about my outfits this past week. Last weekend I pulled out all the stops for my Ms. L - we're talking blue-corn crepes filled with ricotta & wild rice and topped with peach salsa, an appetizer of a butternut bisque, and manjar brownies for dessert here  - and I shaved my legs to top off the Beyonce look. (If you're confused, look up "Jay-Z & Beyonce's Baby" on SNL. Emily played "White Butler") So, for the first time since probably September, I could wear knee-length skirts without fear of more dyke accusations!

Ahem, ANYWAY - you can't see clearly in the picture, but I am holding up Ina May's Guide to Chilbirth, Penny Simpkin's The Birth Partner, my binder from my DONA conference, and Gentle Birth by Barbara Walters. This is because I was a NINJA DOULA! My 2nd and 3rd periods of English 11 had just finished Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms. Beautiful book? Yes. Troubling in terms of its portrayal of pregnancy? YES. 

A bit of background: When I was in high school, I was terrified of pregnancy and birth. I was convinced I would die in childbirth. By no fault of my family, I had been inundated by scary birth stories; A Farewell to Arms did nothing to assuage it. In fact, it worsened significantly. 

What IS the deal about the mother-dead-in-childbirth trope?? From "Cinderella" to "Whale Rider" it floods our collective unconscious. I know it's symbolic, but come on!

So I was determined - especially for the sake of my students who are moms (9) or currently pregnant (6 that I know of) - to make meaning and de-mystify Catherine's death. 

On Monday, then, we worked with the symbolic reasons for why she "had" to die. We traced the foreshadowing and looked at Frederic / Hemingway's life philosophy.

Tuesday, however, was my day. I made five groupings of the desks and called them "Birth Centers." (and then laughed about it heartily) Each had a theme: hemorrhage prevention, family present during labor, eating / drinking during labor, beneficial birthing positions, and dangers of cesarean sections. They had 7 minutes at each section to read the handout and take notes on the key points. At the end of the hour, then, they wrote up a paragraph on "Why did Catherine die? What could've been done better?" A lot of the guys cracked up about the nipple stimulation and turned in half-serious notes, but some were real gems! I must admit it was exceedingly edifying to read this one:

"Cat died because she bled too much after birth. If there was somebody there to comfort her, her delivery would have gone more comforting and more smoothly. If she had tried different positions and ate or drank during so that she would have more energy. After the delivery, she should have rubbed her lower abdomen by herself or had a midwife do it to her so it would have closed faster. This is also known as fundal massage. I still say it would have been better if someone was also in there comforting her."

Ninja doula!

Seeing that 5th block (my sophomores in their drama units) were working on their Conceptualization projects for Antigone and my 6th and 7th block juniors were doing a "moving blue book" (three questions, one at each clump of desks) about Their Eyes Were Watching God, it was a pretty good day.

Wednesday too, since it was my self-proclaimed "Why We Love Literacy Day" with a book share, statistics on the value of independent reading, and a quote discussion - it too was swell. Ender's Game, Atonement, and Dante's Inferno were snatched up by the end of the day. Other excellent finds? Never Let Me Go, The Bean Trees, Animal Dreams, Silent Night, The Mists of Avalon, StarGirl, The Red Tent, Notes From a Small Island, and 10 more. Yes, the GoodWill workers have begun to notice me and give me discounts. 

To give you an idea of the average haul, I made a list of the books I got from my previous trip (February 12):

To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper Lee)

The Reader (Bernard Schlink)

Persuasion (Jane Austen)

All Quiet on the Western Front (Erik Maria Remarque)

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (James Joyce)

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (Alexander Solzhenitsyn)

The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)

Thurber Carnival (James Thurber)

A Great and Terrible Beauty (Libba Bray)

A Yellow Raft in Blue Water (Michael Dorris)

Izzy, Willy-Nilly (Cynthia Voigt)

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (Ann Brashares)

Watership Down (Richard Adams)

Candide (Voltaire)

The Cloudy Patriot (Sarah Vowell)

The Dark Wind (Tony Hillerman)

"A Raisin in the Sun" (Lorraine Hansberry)

The Time Traveler's Wife (Audrey Niffenegger)

Bridget Jones's Diary (Helen Fielding)

The Van (Roddy Doyle)

Something Wicked This Way Comes (Ray Bradbury)

Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Stieg Larsson)

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (Mark Haddon)

In the Lake of the Woods (Tim O'Brien)

The City of Falling Angels (Berendt)

And that is that.

It's approaching 10, so I should hop off to write / read / perhaps watch Away We Go or Casa de los Babys. Tomorrow I have to wake early so I can knock off some of those wretched UNM assignments before the rest of the day is dedicated to celebrating old St. Pat! 

Yours in literacy, education, and empowered birth.

Over and out ~

i have heard the mermaids singing, each to each

It's almost 9.30pm - a full hour after I went to bed yesterday - so this shall be brief. I thought a quick note was, however, in order: Welcome back to the school year! Two weeks into the semester and part of me is still adjusting; part of me feels as though I never quite left my little windowless 228.

But today we were working with figurative language, speaker, and mood with "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." First, if you have never read this poem or haven't done so in the last year, please cease reading this and read it immediately.

Second, except for in 6th hour (which was catastrophically bad for whatever reason), junior classes were engaged and intrigued. They also readily and excitedly read the first part of "Krapp's Last Tape" by Samuel Beckett. (Inspired by Eliot's work, it's a brilliant one-man show also readily available online)
I'm not sure if it's the Dante epigraph, the ether, the yellow cat fog, or the perfumed dresses that got 'em. I think they also enjoyed my imitations of crabs and disembodied shoes in reviewing synecdoche. 3rd hour, traditionally a meddlesome class, listened in rapt silence as I read the first part of the poem. When I paused, a student said softly, "Please keep going." They also were the most enchanted when I had them visualize how I had seen "Krapp's Last Tape" - done by my beloved advisor A. Manley in an old gasworks building. In the winter. Without heat. With one naked bulb, cellophane, and a scratchy tape recorder.

Before I began, however, I had to have a little plug for rereading poetry. I thought it turned out prettily so, as much for my own memory, I'll commit it here: Re-reading poetry is like hiking on DY. It's like hiking in the riverbed that winds up to near the top. You know how you can find the bits of turquoise in the sand? That is what it is like. DY is always beautiful - a poem is always beautiful - but there is always something else. Something sparkly and precious. And new. To be found in each reading.

Happy Friday!
Over and out.

in the wake of the Koyem:shi

I'm headed off to aul PodjaQ in a few, but it should be noted: I did it.
I completed my FIRST semester EVER of teaching.

And PhotoBooth / Checkers / our couch saw me through it.
Picture highlights from the week:

Driving back from Pojoaque last Monday - which took an inordinately long, if beautiful time because of the ice-tastic, snowy conditions - I found a completely dark Zuni. It was when I passed the Giant gas station and it too was completely unlit, that I realized. WOW! Desh:kwi is here! Desh:kwi is the time when Zunis fast and reflect on the new year, and it is characterized with no outdoor lighting. It was really very beautiful to see the Village truly looking like a village.

Stranger, however, was when I came home (6ish) to find our house completely dark - but Emily's car was in the driveway. She opened the door for me and let me into our pitch-black house. The dialogue went as follows:

Me: I thought Desh:kwi only meant outdoor lights had to be out --?

Emily: We are strict Sha'lak'o house here.

Me: (laughing) Okay.

Emily: Yeah, the power went out about half an hour ago. 

Me:  Wait, what??

(Desh:kwi starts on the 20th)

This has prompted me to create a list: You Know You're in Zuni When:

• You assume a power outage is, in fact, the advent of a religious holiday.
• You get a stomach ache and suspect that a couple of your students may be cursing you.
• Your petsitter is late because she was making fetishes.
• Your car hood is marked with a weird design and you blame hatikwes (witches)
• Your students give you roasted corn, oven bread, piki bread, hot cheetos, and kool aid seeds as snacks.
• Your students' parents coordinate the coming of the gods.
• You hear scratching under the house and secretly fear the A:doshle (boogeyman)
• Your scabbed lip is from eating outside and subsequently having a witch suck on it

to be continued. . .

This was us midweek. I think this was Tuesday, when I realized that I needed to make up my unit tests, finish putting in late work, create a detailed unit plan for UNM, finish reading journals, and I would get 86 portfolios the next day. As you can see, a soporific Checkers was most sympathetic.

Me with one such portfolio. It's a little hard to believe that as of 8.30am this morning, I had: successfully printed and distributed the December edition of the T-Bird Times, graded ALL the portfolios (including some real dogs and REAL gems), given unit tests (a bluebook and a persuasive essay on whether Zuni should get a casino [please no]), had my sophomores make vegetable fried rice, did a day of humor and a day of Edwin Arlington Robinson & Edgar Lee Masters (when in doubt, have students read a "Luke Havergal" one act you've written in college), and. . . well. Isn't that enough?

Now off and away - Pojoaque today, Indiana tomorrow, and Iowa for Christmas!

Over and out!

Breastfeeding and Backwards Planning

Today, I called the Zuni Indian Hospital.
Nurse: Hello, Indian Health Services, Zuni. How may I help you?
Me: Hi! I was just wondering if there were any childbirth education classes offered here?
Nurse: Hmm... I think so? ... Let me transfer you over to OB!
Me: Thanks!
Nurse: No problem!

(Gee, this is going well!)

OB Nurse: OB.
Me: Hi, I was just transferred over here. I was wondering if you have any childbirth education classes?
OB: What?
Me: (repeat first line, only a bit more slowly)
OB: What? You havin' a baby?
Me: Um, no. I'm a doula in the area and so I was compiling a list of references.
OB: (long pause) I mean. Yeah. I think we do. It's the weekend.
Me: Yeah?
OB: Yeah. The administrative staff will be back tomorrow. Call Women's Health at 541.
Me: 541. Great! I'll do that. Thanks.
OB: See, it's the weekend.
Me: Yep. Thank you!
OB: Bye.

Ah, gotta love the roundabout.
Thanksgiving break has been a great time to dread returning to teaching, spend some wonderful cooking / chilling / Dog-Show watching with the parentals, and re-kickstarting my doula training. In the melee of, well, everything, my certification work had been postponed.

But as of today, I finished a Breastfeeding Basics course! It was a free - and excellent! - survey course aimed at informing medical practitioners (and more peripherally midwives / doulas / mothers) on the science, troubleshooting, and general universal advantages of breastfeeding. I WAY recommend it if you think you'll be breastfeeding any time soon :). Though you can complete the course in a linear fashion, it also allows you to skip around and read on topics you have more interest in. www.breastfeedingbasics.org . Also, if you have any questions on jaundice, the advantages of breastfeeding, or the composition of human breast milk, feel free to drop a line!
This completion has also re-kickstarted my confidence in marketing myself as a doula (especially as a volunteer one). Breastfeeding was the area I felt weakest in at my friends' birth last winter. Now I feel comfortable with general technique (more than half the areola, tongue under nipple, belly to belly!) as well as the science / literature behind it. I'm sure after I finish Spiritual Midwifery and The Breastfeeding Mother's Companion (my two current doula books in addition to the school Red Scarf Girl and Atonement for leisure), I'll feel even more confident. Now, to the best practice there is: working with mamas and babies!
Oh, a quick note: especially after grooving with Ina May, the Breastfeeding course seems a little sterile. If you don't know Ina May, you should. She's the psychedelic Nana midwife of the movement - her Spiritual Midwifery, which is her earlier, and hippier version of her Guide to Childbirth, is part Bible, part manual, and part oxytocin trip. All of her recommendations and farflung opinions are anecdotal, but underpinned with pure science. I like this comfortable, inductive style; it makes it feel more intimate and woman-centered. The breastfeeding course, while working towards the same end, made me feel more clinically distanced. The focus was certainly a medical one - they said clearly at the beginning that breastfeeding was an ideal process, but then spent the rest of the time troubleshooting the process as if it were rigging up a carburetor. I suppose the main difference was rhetorical? It's unimportant, just a note I had.
Meanwhile, I also looked up some national volunteer doula programs. There are a couple really neat ones, especially in San Francisco. Hmm. . .

Also: the AKC Dog Show made me feel as though we should probably have a Rez Dog show here in Zuni (Cheerleading fundraiser). The categories would be: car-chasing, siren-barking, cutest mutt, ugliest mutt, will-actually-bite-you (as supplied by Emily), and rezziest.

You know you want to enter.


ONE last note from Thanksgiving: First off, it was a delightfully lethargic day. It began with a big big big breakfast at the Inn at Halona (we're talking eggs, hashbrowns, pancakes, fruit, and tea) with the padres. Our breakfast the day before was shared by a cool film couple who encouraged my theatrical pursuits and left their info in case I'd ever want to teach the Inupiak up in Alaska. Hmm, as Emily said, "probably next week."
Anywho, breakfast and round one of cooking back at ye olde trailer #5. Then back to Halona for afore-mentioned dog show. Then cooking and eating and relaxing. We - parents choice, promise! - also watched "Imagine Me and You." If you haven't seen it, it's a DELIGHTFUL lez romcom.
I had never thought of myself as remotely conservative - I'm probably akin to a baby-loving, tree-hugging mystic Bolshevik - but I realized queer theory wise, I'm happily traditional; I once heard "Imagine Me and You" for being criticized as utterly unrealistic. Well, then. I'll let you know when I see a Romantic Comedy that IS based in fact. It normalized a lesbian relationship in the way that "The Kids Are All Right" tried but failed. Go, "Imagine," go!
Moving on, in preparation for the early arising and trip to Amtrak Gallup, we got in the car to pop back to Halona -- only to find our one route blocked by the Christmas / Thanksgiving / Shalako night parade. I mean, of course. So, we walked behind the parade - blaring Christmas tunes and weaving through all of Zuni - until Halona was in sight. We said goodnight, but I walked back to the Giant gas station so I could see the first part of the parade.

One image: religious elk dancers, in full regalia (antlers, turquoise, tall cloth boots, prayer canes) dancing to a drum circle. BUT, the song the drum circle was chanting? A Zuni language version of "Good King Wenceslaus." The antlers of the dancers? Hung with tinsel. The boots? Jingling with jingle bells. The prayer canes? Striped like candy canes. Holla back, hybrid identity!

This past month (and then some) has been such a blur - it feels like practically no time has elapsed since I wrote my Police entry, while also Halloween seems like eons ago. Go figure.
Halloween was swell, though, as these pictures provide ample evidence:

Yes, we carved four pumpkins and cadged another. A couple were stolen by errant students, but retrieved from down the drive. And yes, that IS a Zia pumpkin. Yes, it IS awesome.

1. Dramatic reading of "The Raven." Check it out.

2. Yes, curriculum supervisor, I am using the textbook on a daily basis.

3. How good does our ristra look? (a present from the lovely Lyly)

Halloween was professional development - it started out in a spooky scary way learning that I could work the rest of my life in the ZPSD, but only half of my retirement could be collected by a domestic partner (as opposed to 100% by a spouse). Cute, institutionalized bigotry. Cute.

But then the trick-or-treaters came and sang their Halloween song and loved our puppets answering the door, so all was well!

OH, it has also been in the last month that my classroom got up to 92 degrees for about a week. 

I don't think I need to say more than that. It was a time of utter and abject misery where no learning and much frustration was present. 

I must pop off soon to grade my memoirs, my Spider vs. Wasp comics, my accounts of discrimination (so far, they've been well-written and revelatory), and my Sojourner Truth paragraphs, but I need to make note:

VISITING CC LAST WEEKEND WAS AWESOME.

Good. 

I got to see the great "Opiate" twice - I can't tell you how wonderful it was to see THEATRE, and furthermore how delightful it was to sit up in the booth on Friday night. Similarly, attending junior seminar and having Ethiopian food and the BGP and the cast party and "Fire and Brimstone" and brunch and DogTooth and Poor Richards and angelic Ellement and and and -- 

It was an immensely rich weekend, thank you to all.

Also, thank you to all my friends who said, "OMG I LOVE your blog." You've gotten me to resurrect it, albeit with an odd holiday post that's more natural birth than teaching reflections.

After picking my parents up from Amtrak Albuquerque one week ago, we got stuck in crash traffic (http://www.koat.com/news/29818639/detail.html) and it took us 6 hours to get back to Zuni. After a reckless and sleepless CC weekend, this was the icing on the cake. However, thanks to my parents coming in as guest lecturers, I got sleep and my kids sure appreciated the enrichment! My mother taught a ladder of abstraction lecture with apples and my dad brought a poetry-writing workshop. 

By in large, my kids were remarkably focused and respectful; it's not easy to conjure up attentive students the two days before Thanksgiving break. My 3rd hour crazies were still crazy for my mother, but simmered down and were nonissues with my father -- this confirmed my suspicions that those three guys almost certainly have issues with female authority figures. Hmm, hard to know what to do with that.

But we got some beautiful work especially in poetry form, but it was also great to see my students get warmed up and engaged into describing their homely, Halona apples. JC gave a lovely note to my dad, and MN became one of "Doc's" biggest fans from the moment he held the door open for us as we walked up Monday morning.

**At this point, I'd like to summarize what I've done teaching-wise for the last month. Then, I realized that this would be a fruitless venture. At the end of a week, it almost seems too big to condense, let alone a month. I'll leave it at this: scary story contests, dramatizations, reading circles, tearing apart and writing about osage oranges, Making Meaning (thanks to Professor Pence, the awesome master teacher), banned book projects, another issue of the T-Bird Times (plus community distribution), newsjournals, peer revisions, reading reading reading. . . **

More easily:

So, what's on the docket for tomorrow?

My sophomores, in conjunction with Red Scarf Girl, will re-imagine Zuni as if it had a communist cultural revolution and give tours in groups; my journalism kids will read through our survey results of "What are you thankful for?" and prepare for training from documentarian MS for an oral history project; and my juniors will begin Cather's "Wagner Matinee" in groups in preparation to study the complexity of hard-bitten frontier women. My cheerleaders have typical MWF practice, but also games T&Th. Oh, boy.

All in all, it's looking to be a good week! Now, to gather up the gumption to do it.

Over and out.