Zoo Dinner, fabric art, and a long, wet run

Life continues to be rich and full here in Enoughsville. 

The week started off with a bunch of wild animals (bearing strong resemblances to my family members) joining us for the occasionally-annual "Zoo Dinner"!  We didn't have a lion lying down with a lamb, but we did have Tigers sitting around a table with kangaroos, which I guess is kind of similar.

Tigger, me in animal prints, cow, monkey,
and a pair of kangaroos.

The food came out well:

boa constrictor calzone, mouse taters,
coral reef with turtles and octodogs,
and of course the Ham-bear-gers.

And we ate it, as per custom and obligatory photo shot, through the bars of the chairs.

Not as easy as these animals make it look!

The day after the zoo dinner, Nelson headed back to Minnesota, and I went back to teaching.  We're in the last six weeks of the semester!

It's been a while since I did an update on my progress with the denim yoga mat, and just to help myself keep track, I'm including a photo of just how far I've gotten.  It's coming along nicely!

It's tall enough now that I moved up from the floor,
to a footstool, to a chair,
to a bar stool!  
Next, will come standing.

Inkling has been much more successful in finishing projects.  

"The blanket I made as a fundraiser for the youth square dancers"

For a local production of Into the Woods:
"(the Wolf's sash and Red's hood)"

And just for more adorable (and educational) cloth and clothing, my college put on a community "Cherry Blossom Festival" in our gym, as an educational outreach to the community.   I didn't get to go (I was resting up from my half marathon), but Inkling and Kinderling and the grandkids did, and they had a great time.   

Learning about kimonos, and getting to pose in one!

Speaking of the half-marathon, it's done!  All week long, the weather forecast had been predicting we'd be doing this event in 39° rain, so it was a delightful gift that the day started out cool and overcast, but not cool and rainy.  

A bunch of women from my church ran either the 10k
or the half marathon.  I think we need to get matching windbreakers!

The rain held off until mile 9 or 10, so we ended the race a bit soggy, but by that far along, the rain actually gave a bit of variety to the event.  And we all finished strong!

Some of us accepted plastic mylar blankets afterward,
and some of us eco-nuts graciously declined.

Does my advancing age slow me down?  Today's run was about 3 minutes slower than my run 2 years ago, so maybe a little, but I'm still (barely) sub-10-minute miles, which one of my students once described to me as "I heard that's a good pace for someone your age".  Yes, yes it is!  One of my buddies saw the results on line later and texted us all:

'Snough! You were 2 minutes off medaling!! 4th in your age group.

And then, thinking a bit, she followed it up with this;

Phew. That would have been annoying to have to stand around shivering, waiting for the medal you were going to refuse.

I love my running buddies, very, very much.  (And I'm also very glad we're done with training for this particular half.)

And that's the news from our family, which continues to be wealthy with our adventures.  May you and yours be similarly prosperous.  

Haiti, and one person in Haiti

As human beings, we're hard-wired (or soft-muscled?) to react more deeply to the needs of one person than to the plight of a people.  We're relatively likely to reach into our pockets when we hear the tale of one orphaned child who needs money for school supplies; we as a species don't tend to shell out for an entire village that is lacking books, or pencils, or desks (not to mention parents).  That's the conundrum that people in the Rational Altruism movement are trying to counteract, because it makes no sense, they say, to fritter away large amounts of money doing small acts of good, when we could direct our money more wisely—do so much more good in the world––by thinking more about overall impact than about individual stories.

I agree with the rational altruists so much. 

Except that, right now, I'm an empathy blob, hanging onto (and aching because of) the particulars of one unhappy person living in the midst of a country that's desperately unhappy.  If I could figure out how to help the people of Haiti, I would—but mostly because I know Xavier.  And I have to admit that, over the years, our family has helped Xavier while abandoning the rest of Haiti.  

For a couple of years, while he was still in his early teens, we spent hours and thousands-upon-thousands of dollars in an unsuccessful attempt to adopt him. When that didn't work (and as he aged out of adoption eligibility), we sent money through a mission for his schooling.  For a while he lived in an orphanage and we helped support that place; later we just carefully paid the schooling fees.  When he graduated from school into a land full of hunger and poverty, we sent money through the mission to deliver him and his mom a supply of food each month for a year.  More recently, we bought him a motorcycle, hoping he could use it to earn money taking other people for rides.  In some sense, we've been pouring money into a deep hole, trying to our best to do it in a way that didn't end up making things worse. 

I don't think we made things worse, but "worse" is the only way to describe what's happening in that beautiful country beset by horrors.  A recent NYT article describes this:

The national police, outgunned, outnumbered, underpaid and demoralized, have ceded control of most of the city to gangs.  A United Nations official in Haiti said in December that gangs controlled about 60 percent of Port-au-Prince. Now analysts like Mr. Espérance estimate that the figure has risen to more than 90 percent.

Videos posted to social media in recent days show residents fleeing their homes in the capital as fires burn and smoke fills the air. Other videos show crowds of people fleeing gunfire, and groups of men armed with rifles patrolling the streets.

I've been a bit of a rational/empathy mess this past week, not so much because of these blips of news I read (and, again, I read them mostly because I know Xavier), but because of the particulars of how Xavier himself is living, barely, through these hard times.  It's not only that I feel for him, but also because my brain keeps arguing with me, with random (yet related) thoughts swirling around:

• Does it make sense to help one person from this country, when so many other are in the same situation?
• How (like seriously, how) could I even help?  Things are distressingly bad there.
• The fact that I even pay attention to news reports about Haiti is because I know Xavier.  Does that mean this kind of empathy is good for focusing my attention?  I'm sure there are other places in the world that are messed up and that I'm completely unaware of.
• The colonial legacy sucks, and I'm part of that legacy, and I benefit from that legacy just because of where I live and what I look like.  
• It seems to give him comfort that we just We-chat somewhat regularly.  That seems like such a minimal response . . . but it's something.  (Is it?)
• Should I do more for Xavier?  . . . but that leads me back to "what could I do?" and the whole one person/many villages thing.

So, not knowing what else to do: I've reached out to the missionaries I know who shuttle back and forth between the U.S. and Haiti, and I've asked them how they're doing and if I can help them in any way.  (Expanding out, a bit).  They haven't responded, which is normal -- communication takes a while.  I also keep we-chatting with Xavier because he keeps pinging me to ask how my day was (and mostly not talking about himself).  And I'll keep doing both of those things, and also fretting about this.  Eventually, I might do something else . . . although I don't know what that might be yet. 

And, just in case you'd like to see Haiti through the eyes of Xavier, here's a conversation we had over the course of a few days recently.  The more I reread it, the more minimal my own responses feel; I just remember mostly being shocked and numb; I didn't want to promise what I can't figure out how (or whether) to give.  

A recent conversation

Hi mommy!!! How was your day

Hello, Xavier! I'm doing well. Yesterday I caught up on a lot of work, and today I'm taking a train to a nearby university to give a math talk.

How are you doing today

Well! I love giving math talks.

That's awesome mom!! How was your day? Where is dad?

Mom I have something to tell you guys but I want you to take your time so I can tell you.

Because I am really in needed mom I don't know what to do

When you have time to hear from me you'll tell me

Mom I need to talk to you

Mom!! Even if you are busy or not but I'd like you to read this carefully.

OK, I'm done with my math talk.

I know that you have tried so hard and many times to make me happy though but the situation that I am living in here even your dog is not in that side, I always tried to never tell you that before but now I can't anymore cause it's too much for me 😰😰 my mother is getting sick she's out the country she needs to do surgery for cancer and the worst is that the gun man (gangsters) they are in Montrious right now they set my house on fire 🔥🔥 broke my bike and I just run that's why I'm not dead today so many people are losing their house people die so me I am at a friends house not too far even (name of city) the city that Mr. Zachary come from. The gun man are taking the city, mom I don't know what to do anymore the hungry are killing me today makes me three days with no food, to let you know mom I am not OK for real and I don't ask you for money but mom now I can't anymore cause I don't deserve this so I tell you because you are my only hope, and the one who I put my trust in after God, but even if you don't really know the things in here I believe your son I don't wanna die here mom

I talked to dad and he tells me he's with Nelson in New York City.

Yes he is – in New York. Thank you for telling me how you're doing. I'm not sure what else to say. It sounds so scary

Not only scary mom it's the kind of the end for me, sometimes I try to tell you but no way I tried to ask some other friends for help but I feel shy cause I feel it's my destination

I know you have been tried  so many times to make my life feel better mom but in here there's nothing better only thing that having here is war every day

So I tell you mom

Even if you trust or not but I tell you my life story because nobody don't know my life more than me

I believe you

I know mom!

Sometimes mom at the friends house where I live they cook and don't share with me I sleep in the floor without no bed.

Wow.

I have a friend from Boston sometimes not often he's the one who sent me five dollars or $10 and it could not cannot do even a breakfast in here but I took it cause I am in need but you know I know you've done for me mom that's why I never tell about anything

This is a hard world, and I wish I could change the bad things to good. I will continue to pray for you. Sometimes it is hard to remember or believe that God is good, but I have to keep praying anyway.

Don't know what to do but God knows

I love you

Not much than me mom and I will always

If you have the possibility to mom!! You could send me some thing if you have it though cause I need to buy a carpet for sleep, and if you can do that for me let me know and I'll give you the information how to send it for me please mom I ask you but I don't beg you

I don't know if I can. I will try to talk to the mission, but I do know from past experience there anything we can do will take a long time. So I can't do anything quickly, for sure. I'm sorry.

OK mom!! I am OK with that I understand, you don't have to be sorry for that it's not your fault it's just my destination dough

I'll try another way

God knows

Take care. I just got home, so I'm going to sleep. We'll talk later.

OK mom thanks for your understanding and all the love that you give to me, have sweet dreams! With love! Your son

Shower curtain appreciation: I'm hooked

I'm trying to not take ordinary things for granted.  It's easy to get excited about new acquisitions, and it's easy (oh, man, so easy) to get bummed out by world events or even by having the usual end-of-semester whirl of very-very-very much to do.  It's harder to remember to carry past gratitude forward, into the present moment and into the particular space I happen to be occupying.

Here's one exceedingly ordinary thing I have been contemplating with gratitude lately: my shower curtain.  When I'm in my shower, I usually am recovering from a run --- which means I've been with friends and that I still have a healthy body.  When I'm in my shower, I'm not simultaneously getting wigged out by incoming emails, and I have clean water.  Also, hot water.  Life is good.

The particular shower curtain in my particular shower is another reason to be grateful.  I grew up with plastic shower curtains, and for some reason I therefore thought that plastic was the only kind that would "work": it's been a revelation to have a cloth shower curtain that does a perfectly fine job of keeping water in the tub area.  (The plastic in evil plastic shower curtains is the same kind -- PVC -- that spilled outside of East Palestine, and avoiding the kind of toxins that can harm me and people in factories or alongside train tracks thousands of miles away from me is yet another reason to appreciate my cloth curtains).

This particular set of shower curtains came from a thrift shop nearby: so score one for frugality to my pocketbook, and score one more for reusing existing manufactured items.  I groove to the colors -- the dark green and gold.  Coolest of all: this shower curtain has an unusual feature, in that it opens in the middle.  

An excellent place for hide-and-seek,
say my grandkiddoes. 

Have you ever seen a tub-length shower curtain that opens in the middle?  I hadn't, at least not until I got this one.  You might think that the opening would let water escape onto the bathroom floor, but that's hasn't at all been an issue. 

At the same time/place I got the shower curtain, I got these hooks, made of metal and glass, and shaped a bit like question marks.  They're really easy to attach and un-attach, much easier than the circular snap-together hooks I've used for most of my life.   

I'd tried similar hooks in the past, and the hook part kept coming off the bar when I slid the curtains open and closed but -- and here's more of the magic -- because my shower curtain opens in the middle, I don't have to slide it along the rod, and so the hooks are perfectly happy hanging around in place, being their little square selves right where they ought to be.

Also, the squares on the hooks echo
the gold squares in the pattern of the curtains.

And so this has been a bit of a happy spot for me: clean water, healthy body, cloth curtains, ease-of-use, happy colors, and occasional hide-and-seek potential.  

Update in the Round, during the week of Pi Day.

Life continues to be rich and full here in Enoughsville, as we wind up a week that has been one kind of holiday after another:  this past week has included the day that clocks change, Pi Day, the Ides of March, spring break, and (unofficial, but just as wonderful) trips and visits.  

Spring break and clock changes -- together with amazingly cold and windy mornings -- combined to give me two excuses for sleeping in late.   Normally, I'm up before 6, but this week there have been several days when I woke at 7:30 or even (get this!) 8:00.  It's been decadent, I tell you!

Monday was not one of those days.  Monday, my husband and I drove to Secaucus and from there took the train into New York, where I got to visit the Museum of Mathematics, a place I'd long wanted to see. I toured the museum with one of my former students, who was every bit as curious and engaged as I remembered from when he was in my class. We had a lot of fun solving puzzles together and playing on the equipment. Ever since I saw it, I wanted to ride the square-wheeled tricycle, and Andrew and I had a blast going around and around on the bumpy road, whose bumps were spaced just right for the corners of the wheels.  

Yee-haw!

I also got to sit on an incredibly fun chair (if you can call it a 'chair'), whose base was shaped a bit like a child's top, and that had me going around in different ways.  

Whee!!

And there were logic mazes, and magic squares, and video screens that allowed you to turn yourself into fractal trees.

What did the acorn say when it grew up?
Gee; I'm a tree!  (Geometry!)

I mentioned that this is a place I'd long wanted to visit, and I'm very glad that I finally got the chance, and also that I got to go with someone who enjoyed it with me. I don't think it's worth the time and expense of making it another day trip, but if I happen to be in NYC again, I could imagine splurging to go back.  

The best part of the week was hanging with family.   For example, I got to spend an evening with my two older grandkids.  I haven't yet seen C-child in person this week, but I've seen a photo of her in a gnome cap that Inkling knit, and both the hat and the child are adorable. 

Side note: A year or so ago, I'd gathered up large amounts of paper-hole punch discards to make confetti horns, horns that we could use someday in a future celebration.  This week I learned that I should -- if I ever happen to gather up a similar stash again -- store it on a shelf that is much higher than B-child can reach.  She had a blast making it snow all over my command center, and, yes, it was very funny, and yes, I'm still finding little round white snippets of paper to remind me how much fun a child can have when a grown-up's back is turned.  

C-child thinks that's very funny.

At any rate, that's a bit of what I did when we got back from New York:  spent time with grandkids and then with my vacuum cleaner.

My husband, when he got home from New York, turned around and went back to New York for some shopping, and look what he got!  (Or rather, who he got!)

It's Nelson!!  

Nelson is visiting from Minnesota for a while.  And because he's here, and because she could get away from work just briefly, Gosling drove up to visit, too!  It was good to get to see her, we all of us thought-- including Prewash, who gets extra dog treats whenever Gosling's around.

The one Snoughling I usually get to see, I didn't this week, because she's at the big square dance festival.  

But tomorrow night, we'll have our (nearly) annual Zoo Dinner, with lots and lots of us here, and I'll get to have many people around, which is delightful.  And then the semester will roar back into existence for six more weeks.

And that's the news from our family, which continues to be wealthy in our adventures.  We wish you hugs and kisses.

Late advice on how to wake up early.

Nelson called me up the other day to ask me for advice on how to shift his sleep schedule. He said he currently wakes up at 10, and the group home where he lives wants him to be waking up at 8 o’clock, and he’s just not a morning person (he says). What can he do, he asks me? 

Oh, man, I love love love when my kids call me up to ask me for advice.  It’s the best birthday present I could get, and it’s not even my birthday!  Here is what I told him:

First of all, you ARE good at waking up early. You might not have been doing so lately, but there was a good year in your life when you were waking yourself up – without an alarm, even – at 6 AM. That is like an early morning super power, and you’re one of the only people I know who has it. Believe in your own strength!

Second, avoid blue light right before bed. Actually, that’s the wrong way to say it, because it makes you feel like you’re giving something up and will make you want to do it. Rather, find an activity to do for about an hour before bed that you want to do that doesn’t involve blue light. It might be reading, playing a board game with a friend, drawing a picture; think of it as an opportunity to do something else.

Third, find a short routine that you do every night before bed. Maybe you say a short prayer for every person in your family and then brush your teeth. One of my friends walks around his house closing all the blinds and checking that the doors are locked. Your pre-sleep routine doesn’t have to be a big routine; it’s just something that you do every night that will tell your body “now I’m getting ready for bed”.

Finally, when you do wake up, get some natural light. Go outside, and count 10 trees.  Or open up the window shades. In some way though, look at light that comes from the sun.

Epilogue: It’s a week later, and Nelson tells me that he’s been waking up at six, even before his alarm goes off. Am I right, or what?

Epilogue-beyond-epilogue:  it's actually more than a month later; apparently I never hit publish on this post!  Whoops!  Kinda like over sleeping, but different.  Sheesh.

Update in which I decide not to run solo

Life in our neck-o-the-city continues to be rich and full.  It was midterm week for me, and also our last big training run before the half-marathon (two weeks away).  As I write this, I (a) have finished grading the midterm, and (b) am pleasantly sore from a long run, and having both of those big things in my back pocket instead of looming in front of me is pleasant, quite pleasant indeed.

I had a bit of a revelation about running at some point this week.  As I wrote to my Saturday-morning running crew, inviting them to our 12-mile training run:

Gulp . . . this seems like a really long way to run.  I am very glad I have people to run with*, especially as the weather forecast I'm looking at says there's a decent likelihood of snow showers!

. . .  

* I'm realizing that "people to run with" is a big deal for me.  This past Wednesday, I was finishing up my slow 2.5-mile run with June, and trying to psych myself up to head out for 6-ish more miles on my own, and I realized that (a) I really, really don't like running by myself like that, and (b) I don't actually have to.  So I went home instead, and felt blissful.  I think I'm just going to be more intentional about communal exercise (and about avoiding commitments for solo workouts) in the future!

To my surprise and delight, there were six of us who showed up to tackle a dozen miles together this morning -- no snow showers, but a lot of wind, and cold wind at that.  And yet, because we were together, the run together was truly joyful, even when the hills got hard or the wind was evil and ferocious.  It could be a metaphor for life, I suppose, but for me it's just an observation to file away in the mental tickler under "exercising gregariously".

What else?  

• I'm very much enjoying a series of blog-style posts by Sizzling (under the name of "The Sober Essayist") on a platform called "Medium".  If you're interested, you can read along here.  
• I'm delighted that Inkling has made it to the next round of Sock Madness.

• 

  A flat sock that somehow became a proper tube-y sock,
  for Round 1 of Sock Madness. 
  Inkling says, "It'll be a sock eventually "

  
  
• Nelson is having a great time at his job.  He's working the Fryer, and making Curly Fries (among other things).  He enjoys working with people who are mostly his own age.  At one point, he pulled a 12-hour shift, and he even liked that.  Go, Nelson!
• Inkling, Kinderling, Achild and I got to go to a fabulous performance of The Wiz, during which I realized that my grandchild has been deprived: she didn't know any of the story of Oz or its inhabitants.  Fortunately, her Nana could fill her in.  We both loved the tornado dance, and we grooved to the awesome characters who were so well played.

• My guy is back from San Diego, where he'd been all week.  He does have several trips in the upcoming week, but they're very much family related -- involving first me, and then Nelson.  So there will be fun updates in the future.  

And that's the news from our family, which carries nothing that might be a load; may you and yours just ease on down, ease on down the road. 

Early March update, a little late

Life continues to be rich and full here in Enoughsville.  I'm appreciating the early signs of spring -- these days, when I run early in the morning, my running buddy and I see the sun rising.  We know that'll change with the changing of the clocks next week, but it's such a joy not to be running in the darkness these mornings, and we know that the mornings will continue to get lighter as March thaws into April: the rays of sunshine are also rays of hope. 

I'm also appreciating the trees that are budding out all around the city and our campus.  Most of the buds are just little brown nubs, but some of the trees are already flowery.

A show-off-y tree on my walk to school.

As much as I love seeing the cherry trees in bloom (as did the poet A. E. Housman), I also have been walking with a friend who is dismayed by spring's early start.  She's a geologist who is often out in the field doing surveys, and land surveys are apparently much easier to do when the trees are bare, because she and her team have greater visibility that way.  The early budding this year is going to cut short her survey season this year, a problem I'd never thought much about.  Once again, I'm very glad that I get to do math, which I can do in all kinds of weather.

Speaking of math, my class is going really well this semester.  I happen to have a really delightful set of students, which of course makes teaching much, much more fun.  Better yet, my students seem to be really bonding with each other and with me, both in and out of class.  One of the most flattering cases of this is a student who is from a far-away country -- a place where (she tells me) mean street dogs far outnumber pet dogs.  She is understandably terrified, just terrified, of dogs.  But she's set herself the task of getting used to being near my dog, Prewash.  For two different weeks in a row, she's come to my Friday-afternoon "dog days" office hours.  Two other students she's befriended sit on either side of her to protect her from having Prewash get too near.  My student has been rocking the self-directed "exposure therapy", and this last Friday, she even, of her own accord, touched the dog. 

Prewash does her part by sitting calmly and facing away,
being as un-scary as she can possibly be.

I have a lot of office hours each week, most of them with no dogs present, so it's really a sign of trust and mutual admiration that my students are working together with me on math, but also beyond math.  I'm loving it.

Nelson is working, too!  He's not working on dogs, and not on math, but on Arby's.  He had his orientation on Thursday, and started work on Saturday. Gooooo . . . Nelson!

At his orientation.

And Inkling has made it past the qualifying round in Sock Madness, into Round 1.  Whoop!

Inkling:  "I finished my socks (and wove in all 148 ends!)"

Here's what the socks look like inside out.

And finally, for all those who've missed seeing dog photos from Gosling (I raise my own hand here), we have a lovely recent update.  

Gosling: "Three pups enjoying the water and watching for ducks."

The upcoming week will have a bunch of good stuff -- book groups, running, trees and early-morning light -- and then I'll chop off the good stuff by giving a midterm exam, but that will take us into Spring break and clock changes.  Cross fingers that my students do as well as I think they are ready to do.  

And that's the news from our family, which continues to be wealthy in our adventures.  May you and yours be similarly prosperous.

Celebrating my dad's 87th birthday earlier this week. 
Happy Birthday, Dad!