We're here we're here we're here.

We arrived in Aberdeen after the usual bearable, but only just, trains-Atlantic flight, and a long-ish layover in Charles de Gaulle airport. Somehow, seeing these faces makes pretty much everything else disappear. After dinner, we walked by the canal and the river in the rain. Picked raspberries from bushes along the car park. The fireweed, which is my favorite, bloomed everywhere. We intend to live it up while we're here. It's been a crazy summer. Living it up seems like the only rational response.

The Megastore FAQ: Mid-May edition.

Q: How long since the semester ended?

A: Depends on the meaning of 'over.' It's been thirteen days since I finished my grades. But little summer projects, work-related, are lining up one two three four five with no end in sight.

Q: Have you learned to say NO yet?

A: No. Not really.

Q: What flowers have you planted?

A: A heliotrope and three miniature roses.

Q: Is that enough flowers?

A: It is the opposite of enough flowers. It is a scarcity of flowers. It is one trillionth of the flowers I need to plant.

Q: But don't you already have flowers blooming in your yard?

A: Sure. I guess.

Q: So...isn't 'one trillionth' an exaggeration, really?

A: No, it is 'a hyperbole.'

Q: What's the difference? Doesn't 'hyperbole' mean 'exaggeration'?

A: 'Hyperbole' means 'exaggeration for rhetorical effect.' For rhetorical effect.

Q: Seems like splitting hairs.

A: Yes, but for rhetorical effect. So, totally justified.

how it is.

Today, I took my general unwillingness to spring from the bed in the morning and joyfully get about the day's business to a new level (that was a long modifier in the middle there, sorry about that!). Which is to say that I didn't get out of bed until NINE O'CLOCK. From this, I hypothesize:

1. I am carrying around a massive sleep deficit and will not be arising early for weeks and perhaps months to come.
2. I am a lazy brat.
3. both (a) and (b) above.

Well, be that as may be, I arose in a cold, quiet house. (I did open my eyes enough to chat with the historian a couple of times. I'm not a barbarian.) I worked out. I showered. I ate pancakes. (The first pancakes of summer!) 

We have a young friend living with us for awhile. He's a musician. He's working on composing some new songs. I heard some epic drumming from downstairs, because he can and does play multiple instruments. That drumming helped me

1. write notes for two new poems
2. consider a few things I needed at Target (a new trowel, gardening gloves, pruning shears)
3. call the appliance repair guys so they can come fix my washing machine, which has been doing this weird stop-in-the-middle-of-a-cycle for about two years now, so, you know, now seems like a good time to get that taken care of

I also used the drumming to motivate me to

1. load the dishwasher
2. put away a vast amount of clean dishes and other stuff that had been hanging out on my counter for awhile
3. straighten up my laundry room, because I don't need that appliance repair guy judging me like a judgmental bastard

The quiet: the people, it is a blessed, blessed balm to me.

Soon, I will take up what I believe is my big project of the summer, which has something to do with religious language. Maybe archaic and religious. Anyway, why this is a language I keep returning to--I am going to investigate that. The quiet seems like a good locus for a project like that. I will return and report. Maybe. Or maybe I will just keep it to myself, like a novitiate who has taken a vow of silence.

things I am looking forward to once my grades are in.

• planting flowers. loads of them.
• assembling delicious dinners with lots of vegetables. lots.
• wearing white clothes like crazy.
• waking up whenever.
• sleeping with the fan on.
• reading all the books that are waiting for me to read them. maybe Moby Dick.
• watching that damn Lemonade visual album for heaven's sake.
• breakfast with my daughter.
• my parents' sixtieth wedding anniversary party.
• going to Phoenix to hang out with my son and daughter-in-law, and Will and Van.
• writing poems every day. poems for days. poems like mad.
• organizing things around here so that things are immaculate. (I know that's not real, but maybe closer to immaculate. the next county over from immaculate. from here, it's just a short, 30 minute drive to immaculate. I could call immaculate and it wouldn't be long distance. immaculate and I are in the same time zone. like that.)
• making video essays.
• visit to my friend in NoCal.
• long walks at night, when it's cool, with Bruiser and the historian.
• seeing grandkids galore!
• hopefully even more visits to further climes.
• dreaming time.
• and so forth.

I am turning my grades in tomorrow, so all this magic begins in mere hours. MERE HOURS is when the magic starts.

Survival camp.

Basically, this lavender in my front yard contains, like, the hope for all nature:

I know I've posted a video of this lavender already this week. 
But the earlier video was of bees. And this video is of a moth. 
And yes, I know I already posted a video of a moth this week. 
But that earlier video was of an orange moth. And this is a 

video of a white moth, so: totally different.

…or so I like to think. Anyway, this pretty white moth is what I saw as I was about to get into my car to go into work for a meeting and then another meeting. This departure took place at, oh, 9:18 a.m. So before the full weight of The Heat of the Day fell upon us all. I saw the moth flickering there, on the periphery of my vision, and went to take a look.

As my brother used to say—at least I think it was my brother—about living where it is hot: ‘What hot? You get in your car where it’s air-conditioned, drive to work, go into a building that’s air-conditioned, work, and drive home to where it’s air-conditioned.’ Not that living this way has any bearing at all on the future of mankind or anything. Well, today, I got in my car, drove to work, had my meetings, then drove to meet my niece for lunch. This was all lovely, and of course, air-conditioned. Then, I went to Target.

The people, the automatic doors to Target are like a giant maw of cool, refreshing, refrigerated air. I felt it as the doors opened and closed and opened again, automatically. I was drawn into this cool, cool place, an oasis where you could buy a little blouse to go with a skirt for said niece’s wedding, or a new pair of reading glasses, or dishwasher detergent, or, like, gum, all in the refreshing coolness of a world of discount retail that is bathed in an impossible, unsweaty temperature. Anyway, I strolled around the Target, considering this and that, possibly lingering because of the AC.

And then I drove home (air-conditioned) and turned on the AC there.

I feel I should apologize for this post and for my dependency on cool air. But that’s how it was today. It was about shelter from the sun and from the heat, and cool air blowing in my face. Let me also mention the amount of cool, refreshing water I drank today. With ice in it. I guess it’s not supposed to be as good for you, with ice? But sometimes, America, we just plain need ice to make it through.

Summer day.

if you look it up, there's a picture of me.

Not that it really matters, but I couldn't fall asleep last night. 1:30 a.m., wide awake. I got up and did this and that for awhile (on the internet, obviously. I may or may not have purchased a yellow sweater on eBay.). When I got up this morning at 8:30, it wasn't with great energy, exactly. The historian, who had done the same middle of the night wakefulness rhumba, was just leaving.

He drove away. The house was quiet.

I just want an internet beat that
gives me the good stuff. That's all.

I ate my granola and took care of little business items associated with teaching in the fall. Talked to a part-time faculty member. Set up a meeting, then set it up again. And again. Etc. Found this and this and this in my quest for a better internet daily protocol. Took a shower.

Ted Hughes drafted long hand, then 

crossed things out. I am drafting 

on my laptop. I haven't got to the 

crossing things out part yet.

And then started a draft of my/the/a poem. [insert joyful emoticons and exclamation points!]

After awhile, I betook myself to the cinema for an afternoon showing of a movie that has been fairly universally disliked. I brought my own treats: half of a fennel bulb, saltines, a packet of cashews, and a water bottle with my favorite iced tea/limeade concoction. I was the only person in the theater. As I watched the movie, I could see where people would find things to criticize in it. It wouldn't be hard. And yet, as I sat there, the sole person laughing at the jokes and crying, a little, at the moving parts, I thought, but I still like it. It's not like I was trying so hard, either. I liked it.

Oh, like I'm going to tell you what it was. I can feel you judging me already.

my Greek panzanella was even
more delicious than this picture.

After that, I went to the store and bought peppers and cherry tomatoes and a good loaf of bread, a red onion, some kalamata olives and feta, and made Greek panzanella salad, which is pretty much the epitome of what you should eat at the end of a strenuous day in which you have battled fatigue, advanced the mission of your department by emailing from home, made gains on your own internet proficiency, began in a substantial way a draft of one of the two poems you hoped to write this summer, and successfully balanced your critical faculties with your basic dumb love of movies.


Make and eat that salad, my friends, and be whole again beyond confusion.

Not that I'm counting.

While we were watching, sort of, the Golden State-Houston game (game one of the NBA Western Conference Finals, for those of you not paying attention)(what a game! promises to be a great series.), I noted the historian counting silently.

'What are you counting?' I queried.

'How many weeks there are in the summer,' he replied.

He liked to keep track of things, and especially, he likes to keep track of how much time I will have to do what I like in the summer. He is zealous in his pursuit of my having a summer that is optimal, because he thinks that I do too many work-related things in the summer, and thus my summer will be less that fully restorative. (He is pretty amazing, and this is but one of the reasons why.)

He has a point. For one, I went to work both yesterday and today, to do work-related things. And point two, this is, effectively, week two of the summer. There are approximately sixteen, by my count, and while I don't want to get into the game of evaluating my summer while I'm having it (oh, how I don't want to do this! no better way to make summer feel anxious!), I am hoping to do less of going to work and more of not going to work.

Point three, this morning, I woke up to an email from a student (not mine) who is anxious to get into the Publication Center and get help on a publication project that has a deadline (also not mine)! Good grief.  Point four, I am also going into work tomorrow.

Well, enough of that. Today, I visited my salon genius to get my hair shaped up, and I also went to a movie with my beloved aunt Sal today, Hot Pursuit, which was about what you'd expect--a summer vehicle that wasn't quite as funny as it should have been, but still funny, at least intermittently, and we both enjoyed ourselves, and sat around talking afterward, getting a down payment on a let's-get-caught-up chat. She had an ice cream and let me take bites. Lots of fun.

Then I went and worked out, came home, got a shower, and went out for a reception thing downtown for a visiting Mexican film tour. That sounds kind of deluxe, doesn't it? except for the showering and going downtown for the second time today part. Even so. The reception was at a fancy Mexican restaurant, the hors d'oeuvres were swanky, I did my member-of-the-board duty, and it was fun.

In conclusion, I also had an outfit that made me feel swell for a rainy day in May:

taking pictures of yourself in a window? #narcissistic.
great outfit? #requiresaphoto.
that's all.

Clearing the decks

is a metaphor, among the many metaphors I have for finishing one thing before starting another.

Of course, I'm just talking about grading again, which I will be until I am finished with it. Which will be, who knows when. I'm currently pretending that I can still finish by the end of the weekend. This optimism is immeasurably aided by the fact that tomorrow is Saturday and not Sunday, which I briefly lost track of. Phew! Still two days in the weekend.

I just did the math. I will be grading on Monday.

I want to work on my manuscript with a clear head, not with a grading mind.

The above represents a hypothetical and metaphorical state of affairs which, in reality, has never occurred, not every, not even once.

Also, I want to celebrate my mother and go to a movie and take my son to the airport. I'm glad I did the things I did today--breakfast with my friend, movie with my son, birthday outing with my grandson--that meant I graded for two hours instead of a lot more hours.

I have thought about acknowledging the limits of my 'clearing the decks' metaphor by starting on my projects while still grading. Sorting through my clothes. Working on my manuscript. I might be able to manage the first, but not the second. It's a superstition, maybe. Or maybe it's real--there's a cleared-er state of mind that is requisite for revising poems, and it can't be simultaneously working on grading. Not enough processing power.

On Monday, then: on Monday the decks will be cleared. My metaphor will, if briefly, have force. And then, things will be messy again, same as it ever was. But I will have fewer clothes (please!) and a head clear enough (please!) for poetry.

Ten things to do when you have finished the grading.

1. Lie down. You really should. You deserve it. Lie down and finish your novel, or if you are not reading a novel, start one.

2. Review your agenda. In my case, the agenda is entitled, The Get the House in Order Project, and it was wildly ambitious. Some of the stuff on that agenda--that stuff can be done later. Maybe in a few weeks. Resume your lie-down.

3. Okay, fine, get up. Think about dinner. Make soup and make blueberry scones because there are (a) blueberries in the refrigerator and (b) no reasons necessary to make scones if they are delicious and you want to. (check out the butter technique in that recipe--it is legit.)

4. Read some more. Take a short nap.

5. Watch tons and tons and tons of basketball. Revel in both the sloppy and the elegant play of the post-season, especially when you have no horse in the race, no dog in that fight, no team that you particularly care to root for. Learn other teams' players' names. Root for a team that is almost certain to lose to either (a) the Spurs or (b) Miami, depending on which part of the tournament you're prognosticating.

6. Read the nice comments students sent you. Remind yourself that you only had to wrangle with just one student, and even there, the wrangle was civil and is now resolved. Forget about the time when you woke up thinking about said student. Just let that go.

7. Sort through your winter clothes and put them away. Remind yourself how many freaking sweaters you have, not to mention skirts. Make vows about shopping, vows that will no doubt be fruitless but which feel salutary whilst putting the sweaters, not to mention skirts, away for the season.

8. Catch up on the last few episodes of The Mindy Project. This can be done concurrently with nearly any item above, but is worth enjoying on its own. However, eating a scone while watching television will never go amiss.

9. Think about China. China China China!

10. Put off decisions about meetings and commitments. They are out there, calling to you in faint, distant voices. But they can wait. They can wait while you open the windows (figuratively--it's still a little chilly) of your summer life and let the wind chimes make a beautiful, apt music, a music that is spring and the end of grading and the taking in of a deep, expansive breath. Breathe it. Just--breathe.

Best ever hat trick.

Today started out kind of low-key. Because of a late-ish evening last night, wherein I lingered at my book group to chat with my friends, and then watched an episode of Justified, then chatted with the historian about our respective days, and took Bruiser for a walk, and look at that, it was 1 a.m.!, I did not quite finish a little chore for today's course redesign. So I got up and did it lickety split in the morning, then sauntered off to the redesign meeting.

Which was fine. Productive, as these things go.

Then I had a long overdue lunch with my friend, and after that, wandered around Target and was not overly impressed with anything. Sure, I could buy a mulberry lipstick. But I'm pretty sure I have, like, five of them already. Ditto everything else in Target. So I went home--

--and proceeded to conduct one of the very best naps of all time. I was reading some more of Beautiful Ruins, which I was supposed to have finished for my book group last night, but had not. It was good. It was great, and then I was sleepy. I took off my reading glasses and marked my place and fell asleep in an overcast afternoon that was so delicious that it, the nap, lasted for almost two hours.

Two hours is kind of a long nap, if you ask me. It's a possible sleeping-at-night disrupter. I woke up and thought two things:

a., Whoa. Long nap. How'd that happen?

and

2. I need to go to the store and get a watermelon, stat.

I hollered down the stairs to my youngest son to see if he wanted to come to the store with me, in case he had special food shopping needs, such as: buy tortilla chips, and while we're on that subject, buy tortillas, etc. Yes, he did want to come. So we moseyed on over to Macey's and grabbed a cart and discussed this and that while buying

a. a sugar doughnut
b. ciabatta rolls
c. fresh mozzarella (for caprese sandwiches)
d. tortilla chips
e. auxiliary chips of the potato variety
f. toilet paper
g. a bottle of Coke for the historian
h. Perrier for me, because I am fancy like that.
i. tortillas.
j. we almost forgot the ice! but didn't! and then
k., the best watermelon of the summer so far!

My personal superpower, if you want to know, is the ability to choose a watermelon that is not mushy but is sweet. So far this summer, my record is good but not perfect, because the watermelons, while not mushy, have not been quite as sweet as one might like, especially if one's superpower is watermelon selection. But this watermelon! I cut up half of it, ate some, and then scooped what was left in the rind, then scooped some more, and drank the juice. And so forth. And then had more for dinner. BAM the best watermelon ever! (this summer.)

And now, finally, I am duty bound to report that a couple of days ago, I bought a pair of jeans that should go into the jeans Hall of Fame. I am wearing them right now, while I write this blog post. I bought them at the Gap Factory store in Park City. They are a camo print, but dark navy and gray and black. You have to get up close to see their camo bona fides. They are skinny but not super skinny. They are fantastic. Seriously: you would not believe it. And comfortable, which only burnishes their Hall of Fame credentials.

The "Just Enjoy It" Project.

My son--the one who's moving away in a little over a week--called and said he'd like to bring the boys over for lunch. My youngest son decided we should make Chuckwagon, a dish of his own devising, I believe, that consists of a box of macaroni and cheese, cooked up, mixed with a can of chili con carne, with grated cheese mixed in, garnished with salsa and/or hot sauce. I felt fortunate that I had leftover Thai food.


We discovered that among the canned goods in our pantry were precisely zero cans of chili con carne. So I sent my son off to pick one up.

"Need anything else?" he asked, almost out the door.

"Some generic version of Claritin?" I needed it because for some reason, I'm in the throes of an allergy. At least I think it's an allergy. Anyway, I'm in the throes of something that is making me sneeze and making my eyes water, and I do not love it, not one bit.

When you're in the throes of an ailment, it's hard to just enjoy things. But not impossible. Yesterday, for instance, I found a couple of lawn chairs--bright red chaises--that were marked down at Target, which I bought up like a champ. I brought them home and set them up on the patio; I gave one the sit test, which it passed with flying colors.

Last night, I told the historian that I was going to eat my breakfast out there in one of those chairs. Which I did, whilst sniffling a bit and noting that the wind was likely to give me trouble. Which it has.

Even so: there are apples on the apple trees, and cherries on the cherry trees. The heat has had its way with the roses, but there are still roses. The wind in the trees sounds beautiful. My youngest son went with me to Glover's for some plants and potting soil--I discovered a bunch more empty pots that I had forgotten about, so there's a new garden wonderland that I'm about to make happen. Or something like that. I bought a fig tree. Will I be able to make it thrive? Who can say?

The boys and their dad came over for lunch. Chuckwagon was not a hit with either grandson. The solution for this dilemma was obviously a couple of quesadillas. We chatted and discussed and ate, and then they were off. I took another dose of medicine.

I just put clean sheets on the bed and decided which of the kajillion handbags that are basically the same shape I should keep and which I should give away. The laundry is almost done. I'll get to work on those plants later this evening, when it's cooler and maybe the wind will have died down.

I'm in the throes of summer. I have allergies. It's hot, and there's hot wind. But it's a pretty great day even so.

Today.

We went to the farmer's market and then visited the historian's son, where the two littlest girls showed us what summer is all about:

The end of July.

(--although not the very end, obviously.)


Anyone else feeling it? The doldrums, the dog days? The heat?

July is where, in terms of summer, the real collides with the myth, and it is brutal, that collision. Everyone ends up in the ER, where they don't have enough ice and the AC is busted.

Our swamp cooler, which right now is just bringing in the night air on the vent setting, sounds like it is making ice cream or something strenuous like that. It sounds effortful. It sounds earnest, and to be frank, it sounds a little sweaty. That, the people, is synesthesia, the synesthesia of summer.

Here's what we have in the house: no popsicles.

Here's what I want to do: lie on my bed, under the fan, and do crosswords. And reach over and grab my sweaty glass, and take a swig of ice water or lemonade on ice. And complain, let's not forget that. Complaining is my cardio.

Tonight, we went to Brewvies and watched a movie about which we had previously asked ourselves, every time we considered it, "Do we really want to see that? It might be terrible," and when we sat down in the theater, after having downed some lemonade and ice water and pub food, we said to ourselves ahhhhhhhh. On account of the AC. Which was stellar. The movie was not half bad, either. You know, for a summer movie.

And now it is time to walk the dog. In the dog night of summer.

Information.

Today, at dinner with the historian's daughter and her family--to celebrate her birthday, so happy birthday, Anna!--we were discussing a pesky wasp problem in their yard, which brought this infographic to mind:

from www.garethaveyard.com

This also reminded me that somewhere or another I read that some smart guy--some guy I probably read about in the New York Times today, but honestly, I can't be bothered to double-check--right, some smart guy has an infographic feed. Or something. He constantly consumes infographics, which is a good idea, because infographics are kind of awesome. For instance, here's some useful information about the cost of hiring a zombie:

I Hired a Zombie, or The True Cost of a Bad Hire (via Mashable)

And here's one, The History of the Internet in a Nutshell (go on, check it out--it's pretty!):

via Mashable (click here to see it full screen)

I think we'd all like to know about ten of the most expensive meals ever, wouldn't we? Hello, $145.00 hot dog!

...and that is by no means the most expensive thing on the menu.

Well, I wish I were an infographic maker. Perhaps I will become a connoisseur of them. But in the meantime, here is some other information you might like to have about stuff I want to do before I go back to school (too bad I can't/am too lazy to put it all in the form of a well-designed graphic):

• see all the movies
• read a pile more books
• write drafts of ten more poems--by "drafts," I really mean drafts, not finished poems. You know, move my freewriting to the next level.
• make two video essays
• ride my bike in the morning fifty more days (not technically possible, but there's a spirit of the thing involved here)
• notice everything
• see some live music outside
• eat some more good food
• have dinner with some friends
• relax some more, and then
• relax even more than that.

Doable? YES.

Things of which I do, and do not, approve.

I do not approve of

• hot wind
• running out of ice
• a hot laptop. Literally hot, as in it made my hands and wrists hot.
• hot hands/wrists
• nightly neighborhood fireworks. For the love.

I do approve of

• cherries
• Sunday
• reading the entire New York Times
• white beans. And green beans. In fact: beans.
• these daisies, at midnight:

 

 

 

and also these guys:

 

 

Posted with Blogsy

Short movie review.

Prometheus: take a sexy yet clinical robot; a dead guy as hologram--or is he?; one of the bad cops from Red Riding; Stringer Bell playing a squeeze box; a chilly Charlize Theron; the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo as an ass-kicking scientist who can also perform surgery on herself; sundry other disposable characters...and a super-sick, ambisexual, slurpy-looking, squishy, implacable and relentless alien (is there any other kind?) = a jumpy, slightly absurd yet undeniably fun-in-the-summer movie-going extravaganza.

NOTE: my son said, as an advisory before seeing Prometheus, "just tell your brain to ask the questions after the movie's over." Let me just add: scientists--what a wild, wacky bunch!

As Monday abolishes the weekend.

This weekend we saw Our Idiot Brother, which was charming and delightful. We enjoyed it very much. We bought peaches and tomatoes and onions and eggs and bread and beans and squash and grapes at the market. I ate a lot of watermelon. I just can't get enough watermelon. We also bought the most beautiful berry threesome: a basket each of blueberries, raspberries and strawberries. We went down to Utah Valley for a family gathering. I finished my Swedish thriller. I read a manuscript for the press I'm on the editorial board of (nice prepositional ending, eh?). Took Bruiser for several walks. Commented on the initial posts in my online classes. Watched two episodes of the old Adult Swim show Home Movies (streaming now on Netflix, highly recommended). Talked with running son, who jumped back into Utah life this past Thursday, surprising me in my office with a bag of Lays Classic Potato Chips. Read the New York Times sitting at the table under the cherry tree. Listened to a big cracking thunder and lightning storm last night.

Today, I have been in my office interviewing editorial candidates for Folio. And while I confess I wish the unstructured, wander-where-you-will qualities of summer, which often eluded me during the actual time I was off work, would last a bit longer, it's been kind of nice to listen to these potential editors talk about their ideas, their plans, their enthusiasms. The show-up-on-time qualities of fall are pretty good, too.

The good things.

Having my daughter home for a few weeks before she launches into a big brand-new adventure.

Cherries in the fridge. Iced tea morning noon and night. Lemonade. Toast.

AC in the afternoon. The breeze sifting through the trees in the morning. Windchimes. Sitting on the patio for an hour or two, writing.

A beautiful, big, wonderful dog who wants to go on a walk, morning noon and night, and who greets us at the door with a whole-body wag.

Realizing that I have the doldrums every single summer at the exact same time, a realization which allows me to mitigate it, even if a little, even just by writing a list of the good things.

Writing, always. Always.

An old friend, a new friend, the oldest friend.

Daughters and sons, hither and yon.

The beautiful, loyal, funny and smart historian, who is always on my side.

To the desert:

Here, it is hot during the day, as one might expect. At night, it cools down. Here, in this house high on a hill, just north of Joshua Tree National Park, late in the day, we open the doors and windows to let the cool in. Because it's a house I'm not used to, I wake a few times in the night. The windows are uncurtained because the house is remote, and I can see the changing face of the sky. A three-quarter moon. An airy tree. At six, a sky all blue and bright with sun.

In this desert house, there is no television, and more, I need less diversion. Diversion from what? There are art magazines and books. In the past, when I've subscribed to art magazines, they often just felt like pretentious noise. This was especially true when what I needed more than anything was diversion. I am thinking about diversion a lot, because I realize, what I've been seeking to be diverted from is my life, my actual life. I thought the stress emanated only from the job, but that's because the job felt like it was my only life.

But that's done. Today, I wrote a million ideas. Not ideas for diversions, and not ideas for my job. Ideas for my work, my work and my life.

In the desert, like everywhere else, there is a history that lives in the layers of things. Today, we found out about the sea that covered the California deserts. There are artifacts left from the people who lived by it, near the Pinto Mountains. And all over the desert there are oases, where California fan palm trees grow. Yesterday, we hiked up Palm Canyon, outside of Palm Springs. Palm Canyon, part of a complex of canyons known as "Indian Canyons," are not too far from a golf course and resort. All of it is owned by the Agua Caliente band of the Cahuilla tribe. You can't believe how beautiful and how peaceful.

According to the tribe,

With our language dying, our ceremonies fading and the younger generation leaving the old ways, the death of our Tribal leader brought the past and future together in a momentous way. The elders determined that there was no one left among us to serve as the people's teacher, to preside over meetings, rituals, rites of passage, and wield the power of the Um na'a as had been done since the creation of the world. They came to the painful decision that no one would be named as our new net and that the traditional ceremonial house would be burned. As fire engulfed the structure, so went many of our ancient ways. It was time, they said, to look to the future.

I have been looking to the past, to try to understand my own and how it intersects with this particular landscape. Here, in a place where there are so many ruined houses, so many abandoned sites of enterprise and human artificing from every possible era, I'm laying hands upon a will, a desire to start again, an urge from which I will not be diverted.

Here's the thing:

I got up at 6:30 to be at the Publication Center at 7:30 so some students could work on their stuff, and print, and bind. I was in the room with the hot glue and the sharp blade until 11:30. And then there was a meeting. And then there were e-mails and phone calls from students. And students who were all, "So basically you're saying I'm missing three or four things?" with a chagrined chuckle, and I was all, "yeah." And the grading hovering in the short distance.

And still, the people, it's Friday. FRIDAY. And it's also...the end, almost, of the semester. Let the unwinding commence. I said let it commence!