The wind-down wind-up.

Last night at midnight, all my students' work was due. So today, Saturday, my intentions were to:

• get up,
• grade, then
• meet my daughters for a little pre-wedding shopping.

What I did was:

• got up super early. At 10 a.m. I still don't quite know how that happened, but it was so choice.
• ate breakfast and read through the whole paper, including the sports pages' admiration of Kevin Durant, who was the means by which Oklahoma City prevailed last night against the Jazz, alas.
• got myself to my laptop where I prepared myself to grade by figuring out which student groups were missing what, sending messages, and preparing the rubrics. Then,
• I graded one student project.
• and then I went to the mall, which--surprise!--was a madhouse because--surprise!--Christmas.

Never mind. Two of my three daughters and I had our way, sort of, with Nordstrom and selected other stores. Then we sat down and had a restorative repast in the Nordstrom cafe, which involved the wolfing down of sundry french fries and salads and diet Cokes. The bride herself--Abbey--has not yet arrived in town. Those of us who are in town at the moment had this and that to look for--shoes and dresses and tights for the baby. You know, wedding stuff.

At the end of that, which was lovely, I was exhausted.

'Shopping can be exhausting,' said the historian.

'It can,' I had to agree.

'I find shopping exhausting,' he clarified.

'Listen, if I, whose shopping capabilities are considerable, found the shopping exhausting, it was totally exhausting,' I said, taking off my shoes and lying upon the bed and perhaps also under the covers.

We considered our movie options. Although there are a few we want to see, or sort of want to see, that we haven't seen, none of them moved us to arise and go, and go to the multiplex or the art house.

'Let's get some soup,' I said.

'Okay,' said the historian.

'Pho,' I clarified.

'Okay,' said the historian. Soup makes everyone agreeable.

So we tried a new pho place that had the great cultural advantage of being in our neighborhood. It was vegan pho, and it was quite good. We also had a coconut and pandan leaf waffle for dessert, with sweetened condensed milk to dip it in. Because it was our first time at the restaurant, and it's one of their specialties. It smelled like a sweet, baked thing as it arrived, pale green on the plate. It was lovely. And then, we came home and I put a few more ornaments on the tree, and then we watched A Very Murray Christmas and laughed. 

I predict that over the next few days, as we get closer and closer to the wedding, we'll have more and more to do, but I hope we can treat the more and more as special sweet things that are happening--our daughter's wedding, her happiness, the festivities, the joy, and all the lights and shining things gleaming.

My study is again a ruin.

Today I washed the holiday tablecloth. I lit the Christmas tree for what I hope will be the last time, although I really can't say for sure. I still have a little gift bag that has three bottles of glitter and a glue pen, which I used again today to inscribe a birthday card for a one year old boy.

However, the truest measure of whether the holidays are over is my study, which is a disaster. Just as it is every January.

That's because when it was December, time to get the rest of the house all gussied up and sparkly, it happened also to be Old Semester Season, when all sorts of mad Old Semester work needs to be accomplished. Uncoincidentally, that means that there's a massive and ever-increasing accumulation of life-stuff, like bills and magazines and papers and books, occupying surfaces such as the kitchen table and the living room, which have to be moved somewhere to make space for the sparkly. Do these things have actual places? Where they, you know, belong? Probably, sure. But to put them in those places requires thinking, and--at least as I remember it--we were in a big hurry to get that damn sparkle on.

I've been reading--well, at least it's on my bedside table--The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up. I have in mind a life-changing bout of getting rid of things, and then after that, a life-changing bout of organizing. Life-changing, you see, not just figuring out where three bottles of glitter and a glue pen go. In the matter of resolving the ruin that is my study, I will settle for nothing less than total transformation!

Which is why I will be working on my syllabus and an educational comic and a re-narration of a screencast and another syllabus in squalor tomorrow. Because total transformation takes time, and January is New Semesterville. New Semesterville will be here in a red hot minute, so total transformation will just have to wait.

Notes for December.

Here are the things I want to do in December so far.

See a billion movies.

Bake and eat cookies.

Make delicious wintry dinners.

Eat pancakes.

Get a Christmas tree.

Read.

Nap.

Look at Christmas lights, the more colors and blow up figures and white-light-reindeer the better.

Go to Louisiana for college daughter's graduation!

Have piles of family fun with the folks around here, and those visiting.

Possibly take on an epic television program like (finally) Breaking Bad.

OR just watch a zillion episodes of Modern Family or so.

I would like to go for a wander downtown or around a neighborhood with my camera.

I would like to walk someplace where there is water.

This little listicle does not really comprise a story, it is desultory and generic. But I tell you, tonight while we were walking with Bruiser, we walked past a house that had a snowman with lights that changed colors, including all pink, and I thought: December, it is on. Bring me your everything: your evergreen, your wreath, your tangled strands with fizzly bulbs, your too much noise and crowds and excess of desire, your quiet and melancholy. Bring the darkest night. Bring your stars and bring the cold. Bring snow. I'm in the mood for a solstice and a nativity, for song and candles: let's sing and light them together.

New developments.

Christmas is over. We opened--literally--all the presents. HOWEVER: I will not be taking my Christmas tree down anytime soon. I am waiting until my visitors have departed, which is a good week and a half. So settle down, anyone who thinks it should be taken down by now: I am still fill of Christmas cheer, dammit.

Actually, at the crucial moment, I found that my personal Christmas cheer was a tad intermittent. Here are some reasons:

1. No matter how many ways you have made yourself into the Zen, chilled-out boddhisatva of Christmas, you will find yourself kerwalloped by moments of loneliness, regret, and heartsickness. What're you going to do about that? That's your Intermittent Christmas Cheer Syndrome (ICCS) right there, and you need an Action Plan.

2. Do not count on Martha Stewart to help, necessarily. For instance, I made these cookies this year in my "New, Untried Fancy Cookie" category of baking:

I found the recipe in the December issue of Martha Stewart Living. They weren't hard, exactly, but they did require steps, lots of steps, and for what? An underwhelming flavor, even if they did, sort of, resemble a cross section of a cut tree. Which is what they were supposed to resemble. The takeaway here is that I have a whole bunch of underwhelming but visually attractive cookies. I can take them places or give them away, but I don't even feel good about that, honestly. Martha: you did not comfort me in my hour of need.

3. Even if you finish your grades well in advance of the actual Christmas holiday, you might nonetheless find yourself attempting too much. I didn't bake the date-nut pinwheel cookie of lore and legend, which is labor-intensive and cuss-inducing, and I didn't bake the surprise cookie (with a cherry or spice drop in the middle--surprise!). But even so, I made two kinds of caramel and three kinds of cookies, none of which really met the mark, and fruit cake. And almond bread. And the double butterscotch crescent rolls of my youth, a Pillsbury Bake-Off winner, if I remember correctly, and an altogether first-rate recipe. So--that's a lot of baking. One might say too much baking. Or, one might also say a too-quick and sadly-misguided abandonment of the traditional baking ways. One might say: Christmas cookie-baking is not the time nor the place for experimentation MARTHA. Well, whatever one might say, I'm probably going to let the inadequate and unsatisfying cookies take up space in my kitchen until I can work up the gumption to throw them away. And next year, I will make my old, tried and true cuss-inducing recipes instead of new ones.

It's true: one's efforts and failures, of the baking (and many other) varieties, confront one at the crossroads, i.e., where Christmas Eve meets Christmas Day, and one must find one's way to withstand the confrontation, and even to prevail. This is the above mentioned Action Plan. Such as:

a. plan to sleep the entire next day. December 26 found me still asleep until almost 10 a.m., and still in my nightgown until about 2 p.m. It was glorious.
b. cook and eat some vegetables, for the love of everything holy. Seriously, vegetables will not let you down. Good old, plain old vegetables.
c. read something good. I am currently dipping into four books: The Testament of Mary by Colm Toibin, Incarnadine by Mary Szybist, Metaphysical Dog by Frank Bidart, and The Best Food Wriitng 2013 (ed. Holly Hughes). I read two poems today, one each by Szybist and Bidart, that made me gasp, they were each so good.
d. get a hold of yourself, and knock that self-doubt off. You're not so bad, you know?

 

The day.

This doesn't cover all the things we did, but it covers a lot:



Near the end of it all, my dad pointed out that we ought to be able to see the moon and Jupiter. And when we went outside, we could.

I hope your day was happy and joyful.

and they heard him exclaim ere he drove out of sight--

Candy, music, fun.

Tonight, we went to my aunt's house for the annual Christmas musicale. It was grand. There was trumpet playing by my niece, my son and I sang In the bleak midwinter, my nephew was pressed into service, playing Apologize on the piano, the kids joined in on all sorts of carol singing, and we joined together in a fantastic rendition of Bacon Pancakes (led by my son). Super-festive, in other words. Maybe the most fun ever?

In related matters: I made a bunch of candy over the last couple of days:

Listen. I don't know if people even like brittle anymore. I, however, will say this about it:

1. way easier than you'd think.
2. fast--if you've got your ingredients organized, it's like 15 minutes tops per batch.
3. makes you feel like a genius despite 1 & 2 above.

Also:

     4. it looks super cute in a box when you give it to your neighbors. AND
     5.  it must be said: when you make it yourself, it tastes dang fresh and damn good.

(The link above is what got me started. It is the most stripped down, essential version. Here's one that gives you a little foam in the candy at the last minute, which is different and also good.)

A tiny Christmas present.

It's been a wonderful day--breakfast with some kids and grandkids, my writing group, a movie with my aunt, cousin, and the historian, and making some awesome Rice Krispie treats for my son.

But I am tired. So I am offering something I heard yesterday:


 (Remixing the Holidays with Run-DMC, on The Takeaway, Dec. 20, 2012)

 and here's an awesome throwback that I believe you're going to enjoy:






Hope this tickles you and lifts your spirits as it did mine.

p.s. just moments after I posted this, I heard "Christmas in Hollis" on a Honda commercial. Not going to think very much about what that means.

Planning for the shopping for the baking.

The shopping list I composed last night when I was too elated from having finished grading to sleep:

And this is the actual haul:

And here is the first step in the dance we'll call "The Christmas Baking Rhumba":

The baking/candymaking plan (this is the plan of an optimist/overachieving baker who is high on finishing her grading):

1. caramels.
2. brittle: pecan, almond, and pumpkin seed
3. date pinwheels
4. sugar cookies
5. probably those little treasure cookies with a cherry or a gumdrop inside, because I heart them
6. almond bread
7. butterscotch crescent rolls (the dough starts with cooked butterscotch pudding and gets richer from there)
8. fruitcake!
9. two new things: cardamom-and-cinnamon infused honey, and boiled cider syrup, which sound exotic and time-consuming and perfect.
10. probably some other European-style baked goods from a Martha Stewart Living magazine that is sitting around, waiting to be baked from.

Too much?   I am not now, nor have I ever been, a minimalist. And I will be baking, candy-making, honey-infusing, and cider-reducing my head off until Christmas, and possibly beyond.

Today,

I answered a few more panicky student e-mails ("HTMS! I haven't heard from [group member] and I am FREAKING OUT!")(I may be exaggerating a little, but only the all-caps--the rest is verbatim). Then I gather'd my wits about me 'fore assembling my wherewithal and inner resources and whatnot to grade.

In other words, I am not yet actually grading. But by golly I am almost ready to grade.

Instead, today I read more manuscripts for the competition (for which I'm a first reader). I put some envelopes in the actual post at the post office. I took a long walk. I spoke soothingly to Bruiser. And I went back over to my daughter's, where both a little boy and a very little girl (my grandchildren) were available for a visit.

I held the little girl, whom I had inexpertly swaddled (but never mind, she was as cozy as a little bunny in her blanket), and played various games with the little boy. We played Superhero Memory. He beat me once, we tied the second game. He did some puzzles on the iPad, and then we made a little animated movie.

In the app for the animation, you can actually draw characters of your own, and scenes. Which is fun, and also a little humbling.

This figure below is a robot. I actually did this animation with another grandson on another day. He  demonstrated to me, several times, the kind of robot he wanted: it had an arm that would reach up to touch its head, and then its neck would swivel to the side. He was not well-pleased with this robot, but I think you can see the reach and swivel. Can't you?

This is a screenshot from today's animation:

We agreed we would draw a character and also a scene (moon surface, obvs).

"An octopus," he stipulated.

I started drawing arms galore. "How many arms is that?" We had six, added two more.

"It's a vampire," he said. I drew fangs. (I'm particularly proud of those fangs.)

"Put sleeves on him," he said.

"Sleeves but no shirt? On all eight arms?"

"No, just sleeves. Long ones. That's enough," he said, while I drew and undid and re-drew and erased, and we ended up with the outfit you see on the vampire octopus: long-ish sleeves on three arms.
After the visit, which was quiet and sweet, and productive on account of the animation and octopus-drawing, I went to Costco with my son-in-law and grandson, and bought twelve pounds of ham, sliced, for a dinner for homeless men. I took the mighty weight of meat over to my son's house, because they're some of the shepherds of this monthly dinner at The Road Home. They were having dinner, and invited me to have a little with them.

So I put the ham down, and ate a bit of supper with my son's family. We talked about Christmas, and skeletons, and I watched the boys do the skeleton dance, because the older one has a little bit of a skeleton thing going.

As I drove home--it was 6:30, very dark in this darkest part of the year, the Christmas lights blooming on either side of the road--I felt calm. I still have a lot to do. I'm not worried about it, though. I'll get it done.

A little bit abed.

I've seen a lot of my own bedroom, from a more or less prone position, lately. Yes, still the sick. But I can tell I'm getting better. I know this, because I was able to grade today. My eyes felt hot, but not as hot. My head hurt, but I wasn't sneezing my head off. I haven't seen the new baby yet except in photos, but I will tomorrow. So: better.

I am feeling hopeful about the grading. I can only foresee a few little glitches. And I have made up my mind that I will not be running after them, figuratively, begging them to give me the work they forgot, or decided to bail on, or are withholding, just for the fun of seeing me freak out about it. (That last part might not be literally true, ever. But it sure feels that way sometimes.) NO. I will not. They will have to take the grade I give them if their work isn't complete, and we will discuss it in the new year.



(don't hesitate to turn up the volume, if it's too quiet.)

Ill Christmas.

Man.

I hate getting sick at the ends of semesters. However, it appears that it is the way of my life. Via dolorosa de mi casa, as it were. I remember one time, I was so sick at the end of the semester, my first husband and I took to our beds for what seemed like days. We arose from our bed of affliction to go to the mall the day before Christmas, so we would have a present for each other. When I saw some people dressed up like reindeer (can that be right? I was delirious), and I thought, I wish I had brought Prudence (our cat)--she would have loved this.

I'm not that sick this time. But I am all DayQuil'd up and trying to overlap the doses so there's no complete experience of how sick I really am at any time. Because that would be horrible. I can't even bear to contemplate it.

I'm almost done whining about it, hang on.

I did have to go into school to "teach" my last class. Then there was a meeting I chaired. By the end, I basically was walking around like The Empress of Contagion. I considered, briefly, stopping at a store on the way home, but the last shred of reason still firing in my brain told me NO.

All I want for Christmas

...is for everyone to blog more. Is that too much to ask?

I was talking about this with my Scotland daughter today. Well, chatting about it:

me: they're dead to me, the blog-giver-uppers.  But that doesn't seem very Christmas-y. So I turned it into a wish. I just want a daily or almost daily shot of your stories, your images, your errant thoughts. Like this morning, I woke up and the sun was coming up. Even from a horizontal, prone position, I could see the warmth of the colors in the sky.

"It's glowing," said the historian, his first words of the day.

I got up and looked. Across the horse field the cars were on their various ways, to work, school, all and sundry. And in the horse field was an actual horse, just standing in the field, as they do:

(I exempt from this Christmas wish list all the people who do blog regularly or semi-regularly. You guys are good, and I sincerely do appreciate you. Carry on.)

What to do with everything in your pantry.

If you have

• various, slightly shabby-shabby looking farmer's market potatoes
• some still virtuous greens, but looking back upon their day of sale from far away
• garlic
• leftover grated pecorino from a Thanksgiving day salad
• a red grapefruit
• some grapes
• pomegranates whose skins are leathery

 you can make

•  mashed potatoes with the skins still on, garlic (cooked with the boiling potatoes), and the pecorino
• greens, cooked at a rather high heat in the oven with olive oil and garlic and salt and pepper
• a lovely wintry fruit salad of the grapefruit, grapes, and pomegranates.

You will, however, have to gather the pomegranate seeds from hither and yon, and wipe up the juice from the floor and counter and yourself--it's possible you may have let those pomegranates sit on the counter a week too long.

Day Two, the Lights of Christmas Video Cavalcade!

Writing notes.

Today, I went down to the Salt Lake Roasting Co. for some magic writing time. I say "magic," because the Roasting Co. has been, heretofore, a location in which I have been able to wring drafts from dross, revise like a wizard, and even develop new material. Something about sitting upstairs in that building, looking down onto the street, makes me feel free of ordinary obligations and more focused, more intent, on writing itself.

Here are today's results.

First, yet again, I wish I were a person who wrote everyday. I always think, at the beginning of the academic year, that this will be the year I am a person who writes at least a few times a week--by which I mean that I would move my attention to writing that many times, and write some things down. However: I am not that writer, at least not at this moment in my life. Paul Lisicky observed that his once-partner, Mark Doty, considered to be a prolific writer, usually wrote in a couple of big bursts a year, and otherwise wrote only sporadically. That's me, too. So when I say, as I did a few weeks ago, I'm going to find some time to write for a few hours before the end of the year, it means either that I'm hoping for that kind of burst of writing (not likely), or that I'll be looking at things I've already written, hoping to add more to them, or transform them in some way, and maybe along the way I'll jot down a note or two that might become a freewrite that might become a draft that might become a poem. We live in hope.

Second, my friend Kim often says that for a poet, everything is writing. That fetishizing the sitting down at your desk part is just about the same as equating typing with writing. I think this is a healthy way to look at things. All the same, I do sort of believe that regularly experiencing the turn to write (or type), and acting on it, tends to prime the pump. Maybe. I sat down today and looked at the last set of notes I made. They were about a rabbit. And not much more than the word "rabbit." I keep thinking that if I were writing more often (typing), I might have more than this furry little word.

Third, there was a time when I felt moved to write a poem--a draft--often. That is not how it is these days, except for the lucky times when there's a burst. I had such a time this past summer. It was awesome. Now, though, I feel like I write in layers: I have a piece that I turn into a draft, and then the draft takes a long, long time to realize itself. I take the poem out and see if I can identify what it needs, and then I try to write in that direction. Or I've taken the draft to my writing group, and I have their notes, and I meditate on what those notes might say to me that I can use, and then I try to write or revise in that direction. The process is additive for a long time. And then it might be subtractive. Another poet friend talks about having the patience to stay in the writing moment when a poem presents itself. I get that. I'm impatient a lot these days. Sometimes I think, I'll just write the quick notes down and come back to it. But if a poem is on its way, that occasion warrants some patience. Not that any of this happened today at all.

Fourthly, sometimes you have to just feel the revulsion about your work. Just feel it, let it have its moment. And then get back to work.

Fifthly, sometimes your magic writing place won't really do the trick. You're just going to have to live with that.

In other news, I have decided that this month, each day until Christmas, I am going to post a short video of Christmas lights in my neighborhood. With comment. Sometimes my comment, perhaps occasionally the voices of others, and occasionally music. Here is Day 1 of the Lights Of Christmas Video Cavalcade:

But who's counting.

Still have drafts to read, assignments to grade, comments to bestow, consultations to hold, but today I made waffles for breakfast, which we lingered over; picked up eggs and kale and apples from Chad; browsed Sophia's Christmas fundraiser boutique (for a worthy cause); admired the Spiderman detachable arms (can't possibly explain this) applied to another action figure by Deacon; shopped for Christmas presents for the Scotlands (denied!); and bought delectable assorted groceries and flowers. And talked to the oven repair guy (news: not good). And saw Hugo. Which we loved.

With the Folio reading over with, I feel a small window of not-panicking. All last week my lower back was aching; two nights I could barely sleep; I felt, sometimes, like I was only barely keeping it together. No more. Thursday night I slept the sleep of the blessed. And Friday, even with multiple consultations, a short presentation, a meeting, and appointments to help three students bind books, I felt released. Free.

Obviously, the grading/consulting/commenting regime reimposes itself, like, tomorrow. But I am also going to take a long walk and I am going to remember to breathe the December air. I will cook something delicious, maybe some things. And on Monday I am getting a Christmas tree. The end.