Matching Tracksuits

Month: August 2006

Addition

Thursday 31 August 2006

Such an up and down job I have. If only I had a performance car with the handling of my average day: to say it turns on a dime would be an understatement.

Two boys give me hell in the morning. In the afternoon, one of them comes up to apologize, and the other faces off against me in a friendly game of air hockey. I know the apology was not voluntary, and my participation in the air hockey game was by self-invitation, but let’s not get too picky here.

Progress will be progress in the little things, the program director has told us several times, and slowly the little things will add up.

Prank

Monday 28 August 2006

PenJust before my senior year in college, I invested in a beautiful fountain pen: a Cross Townsend. I later learned that somehow I got the pen for almost half the actual price thought a pricing mistake or something. Now a new one costs roughly four times what I paid.

That pen accompanied me through Europe and was instrumental in recording thoughts about Strasbourg, Prague, Berlin, Amsterdam, and a number of other cities.

For twelve years, I’d never even misplaced it.

Today, at work, it was stolen. Or was it?

I had inadvertently left it by my computer, tucked in a notebook I’d been using for notes during a training session we’d had on Friday. After four of the lads had been using the computer, it was missing.

“Stealing is not beneath some of them,” I’d been told. Still, is that something one really wants to communicate to one’s students? “Alright, you jerks — I don’t trust any of you. Who stole my pen?!” Not the best way to build relationships with young men in need of help.

Instead, I gathered the lads together, told them that my pen was missing, and asked them if any of them saw it, to put it on my desk and then let me know it’s there.

A few minutes later, a boy came to ask me if I’d checked in all the desk drawers. “Maybe someone put it there — you know, like a joke.”

Sure enough, in the second drawer was the pen.

A prank? A bit of mercy? Misunderstanding or malice?

So much of our lives is inexplicable like that. Indefinable. Was this a reconsidered theft? Was it a joke? All I know is the pen was missing and then it wasn’t. Almost like I lost it…

Still, for safe measure, I unplugged my SanDisk memory stick and put it in my pocket.

I want to trust these boys, to give them the benefit of the doubt. But at what point does trust become naivety?

Quickening

Sunday 27 August 2006

It takes patience and calmness to feel her. “Did you feel it?” K asks. “Yes,” I say, hesitantly: a small, quick pressure against the palm of my hand could easily be missed.

All this time, K, with her belly swelling, passed through all the early signs of pregnancy, and it was exciting for me, but still somehow distant. I’m an observer, not a direct participant. But once it became possible to feel L’s kicks, a new depth to the situation has emerged. Every day, the reality that we are soon going to be responsible for a little girl becomes more and more obvious and increasingly present. That goes without saying. But feeling L move about makes the realization all the more potent.

Reunion

Friday 25 August 2006

I dropped by the “old school” yesterday to see the kids. They were walking out into the breezeway just as I was turning to go into the office to sign in as a visitor. They saw me and suddenly I was attacked by six children in a simultaneous hug. One, who liked to call me “stupid old man” last year in times of crisis, hugged me about three times while we were standing there.

One child wasn’t there, having already gone to eat lunch with her one-on-one. I snuck up on her and simply squatted beside her and said, “Hi, [Catherine].” She looked at me without recognition for about two seconds, then dropped her fork, squealed “Mr. Gary!” and threw her arms around me.

That gives you a fine feeling indeed.

Clothes

Thursday 24 August 2006

One thing about expecting but not having is the clothes.

Clothes

All clothes, but nothing to fill them with.

Kinga and Dress

Burying Pluto in the Backyard

Wednesday 23 August 2006

And so Pluto is no longer a planet. No longer will fourth graders find themselves thinking in science, “Forget putting a human on Mars — putting a person on Pluto would be the really impressive thing.” Out in the far edge of the universe, Pluto was invisible, ugly, and neglected. And incredibly cool. The very things that makes made Pluto the coolest planet in the system led to its ultimate demise. It’s funky, indecisive orbit means that for periods of several years, it was actually not the planet furthest from the sun. It’s lack of sphericalness made it the ugly duckling planet. This is the most destructive thing humans have ever done, for we’ve destroyed a planet. With a few hours of deliberation, we took a perfectly good orbiting body and relegated it to the same status as Grumpy, Sleepy, Happy, and the rest of the gang. We now have dwarf planets to go with our dwarf stars. The pen might not be mightier than the sword, but obviously, a scientific committee is. At least it keeps its name. Let’s hope the same is not true for Xena…

Thoughts on the First Week

Tuesday 22 August 2006

After a week on the job, I’ve already been called names and cursed, yet I’ve also begun building decent relationships. The two, it seems, are not mutually exclusive.

Working with autistic children got me accustomed to the idea that a child can express great joy at working with me one minute and then call me “stupid teacher” the next. Life in the special ed classroom was life on a swing.

The same, it appears, can be true working with “tough kids.” Indeed, the similarities are sometimes overwhelming. The difference is with TKs, I’m left wondering, “Is it a choice  conscious or otherwise or is it something automatic?”

As an example, take the ability to generalize. Some autistic individuals have great difficulty taking something out of its context and applying it more generally. “Don’t run in the hall” should be generalized to “Oh, then I probably shouldn’t run in the school in general.” Perhaps not the best example, because younger, non-autistic children might have difficulty making that leap.

The opposite can be the case as well: the ability to realize that a general rule doesn’t apply in a specific circumstance. “Don’t run in the school,” we tell someone then find she was refusing to run during gym class because, after all, we’d said, “Don’t run in school.”

During the first week with the TKs, I realized that this is a popular method of defiance. Extremely popular. “You never said” was one of the most oft-heard phrases during my first week.

The Dresser

Sunday 20 August 2006

My latest project — the dresser.

Dresser

Shindig on the Green

Sunday 13 August 2006

Yesterday evening K and I finally went to the yearly Shindig on the Green — which this year would have been more aptly named “Shindig in the Outfield,” as the “Green” it is usually held on is being renovated.

Shindig on the Green XV

So during the next two years, it will be at a baseball field.

We just have bad luck with the SotG, though. Yesterday it rained most of the day, and so the “official” SotG was called off. Those who showed up, though, simply listened to the musicians who either didn’t get word or had come too far simply not to show up.

Shindig on the Green VIII

Such was the case with this band, which had come all the way from Atlanta to play. And play they did, probably about ten times as much material as they were expecting. (Usually, each group gets a two-song set.)

Initially there were two “audiences,” but as the sky darkened, we all gathered into one group, with about twenty musicians playing.

Shindig on the Green XXI

Shindig on the Green XXIV

And some kids out on the baseball field being kids.

Shindig on the Green XXIII

More pictures at Flickr and video at YouTube. (And then there’s last year’s donkey song…)

Music Box

Friday 11 August 2006

musicbox.jpgAt nine o’clock, K starts yawning. She says it’s the pregnancy, but anyone who drags themselves out of bed at five every morning needs no excuses. Since I generally get up later, I go to bed later.

L’s twenty weeks old — she can hear now. And so, on the advice of friends, K and I have begun a nightly tradition. Just before turning out the light, of putting a small music box — a gift from my oldest friend and his family — to K’s belly. The theory is that the music will later calm L, as it reminds her of her old, warm, save home. We lie there silently, K and I imagining what it will be like when she’s falling asleep in her crib to that music, barely able to keep her eyes open, yawning, and remembering how warm and cozy she was when she first heard that music.

Again, that’s the theory anyway. I’m under no illusions that it will work like a switch: wind it up to wind her down. But the hope is it will at least calm her when she’s very upset.

Hear the tune.

Language Log

Tuesday 8 August 2006

My new favorite site:Language Log. “Weblog run by University of Pennsylvania phonetician Mark Liberman, with multiple guest linguists.”

This entry on Dan Brown from a couple of years ago left me wiping the tears from my eyes. In another entry about Brown books, we read, “In short, to call this novel formulaic is an insult to the beauty and diversity of formulae.” (Source)

Really worth a look.

Difficult Demographic?

Sunday 6 August 2006

Asheville School is a private school on the west end of town. Like most private schools, tuition for four years would buy a small house. The students are easily engaged and eager to learn.

I guess. I don’t really know because I don’t work there.

I do, however, now work at a school on the other side of town — in more ways than one. Beginning next Monday, I’ll be working with young men and women, between fourteen and sixteen years old, who find themselves out of school because of either long-term suspension or adjudication.

They would constitute, for many — if not most — a “difficult demographic.” And they very well may be. One thing’s for certain: they represent an often neglected demographic.

My job description includes teaching subjects that I’m not certified in: science and social studies. But beyond that, I’ll be working with them in community service projects and helping with general “personal development.”

In all honest, with most of the folks I’ll be teaching, that means anger management and accepting authority. The practical consequence of this, I’m told, is that I’ll be yelled at from time to time, and cursed. The “stupid teacher” I heard sometimes last year will be tame in comparison. The old teacher’s adage “Don’t take anything personally” will certainly be a mantra for me.

Yet with great challenges come measurable rewards. Teaching at a private school would be easier, from many points of view, but I doubt it would be more rewarding than what I’ll be doing.

It will be tough, but my new boss assures me they provide psychiatric help…

Taking the Bait

Thursday 3 August 2006

I really don’t get it. It’s conceivable that eventually religious leaders would realize that everything Madonna does in her performances is calculated provocation. That when she is on stage, she is performing and part of her performance persona is to be provocative.

Religious leaders in Rome have united against the mock-crucifixion featured in US pop star Madonna’s latest show.

In the sequence, Madonna appears on a giant cross wearing a crown of thorns.

Father Manfredo Leone of Rome’s Santa Maria Liberatrice church told Reuters news agency it was “disrespectful, in bad taste and provocative”. BBC

“Provocative.” Yes, Father, that’s the whole point.

What is wrong with simply ignoring her? Would that rile her more than “censuring” her?

Lena

Tuesday 1 August 2006

“We have to have a serious talk with your parents about pink.” We were leaving the clinic after the confirmation: by some time in late December, we’ll have a daughter — Lena Maria.

Lena Scott I

For months now, she has been an “it.” Rather, we’ve referred to Lena as “Bączek.” “Little fart” in Polish. “This means she is no longer ‘It,'” I thought, when the ultrasound technician said, almost immediately, “It’s a girl.”

“It’s a girl,” and the name dilemma washed away. “Lena” has been our choice for a girl for some time, but for a boy — nothing. Kinga had plenty of ideas, but for some reason, none of them made me feel much of anything. “Lena,” though, has such a warmth, a strength, a beauty to it that I liked it immediately.

Lena Scott II

“She” means directions and details for the dreaming that were never contained in “it”. Vague imaging becomes focused. At some point, she will break some boy’s heart. At some point, her heart will be broken. She will have a favorite book and a favorite game. She will come to me one day, crying with a childhood injury. At some point, I might find myself dancing with her at her wedding. Yet these thoughts are all so distant that they’re just as unrealistic as when we knew nothing more than the potential: “I’m pregnant,” Kinga whispered in my ear one morning, many weeks ago…