The architecture of clouds.

After days of the most brilliant sun, we drove home today in clouds that were so close it felt like you could pull one down into a thin, thin fabric. A curtain. A veil.



cloud architecture from lisab on Vimeo. (music by Cloud Cult)


The power lines paralleled and crossed, an intricate loom. We wove alongside, the highway its own warp to the wires' weft. The cloud a fiber not yet spun to thread.

What held them together, just drift.

What held them together, just friction between cloud and cloud.

What held them together, an attraction to hillside, to mountaintop. To the cut field.

We drove west and then south. To the left, to the right, above us, before us, light and shadow shifting, and always in the shape of a cloud.

It's all over but the proofreading.

In a motel room in Driggs, ID, I have finally finished my portfolio.

the drives. whence comes the documentation.

epic. 

Tomorrow, on to monuments not made by human hand. Made of stone and fire and water. That's all.

In the last five minutes before the grading deadline falls, I shall

consider the unknowability of all other humans, for what they do as students is inexplicable to me, including

• attending class right until the very end, but nonetheless not turning in the one thing that will give them a passing grade
• not dropping the course even though they have long since stopped attending
• writing beautiful work--beautiful!--then disappearing, despite my plaintive entreaties to come back, come back--

and so on.

However, what I will not do in the last five minutes before the grading deadline is grade. Because I am finished.

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.

The new rhythm.

This morning I woke up at the same time as usual, 6:48 a.m., twelve minutes in advance of my alarm. I lay there and let all the indicators do their test runs, then I opened my eyes, put on my glasses, looked at my e-mail.

I needed to be at work by 8:30, and my day would be full. But it would be a different kind of day from now on.

Last night, the Publication Studies class debuted their chapbook, and the winning author read his work. This is the second year that I have not been the teacher of the class, and thus I've been an interested but sort of distant spectator of this process. This, and the publication of the the spring edition of Folio, are two of the big markers of the academic year, that the year has been, as it were, achieved.

It's a celebration and a valediction, wrapped in a small alienation, suffused in an infusion of joy and relief, with a tiny tincture of sadness. Just tiny, but still.

Next week, the work will come in, and I will read the writing of these students for the last time. I'll have things to say to them, again for the last time. Most of us, students and teacher, will have said what there is to say to one another, at least for now. A few of them, I may be having conversations with them for a long time, but mostly one-sided, mostly in my own mind. Because that's the nature of teaching, and semesters. And of being with students, and then not.

Well, I started this post this morning and now it's almost five. My poor husband has caught the sick I had last week, which is so unfair it's not even really comprehensible. So we'll be staying in. I'll be refreshing my course sites from time to time to make sure that no student concern goes unanswered, and getting used to letting go of all that, because hey: the semester is over. And it's time for something new to happen.

You guys.

Okay, first of all: first of all, this is the last day of classes, the last day of classes of the semester that almost nigh unto killed me, as in I am almost dead, but I have survived, I have prevailed, I have a new header!

Today, I read the last of the poems and the last of the essays. Today, I met with my independent study students and advised them for the last time. Today, it is the last day. Did I respond to many an e-mail, many a panicky, pleading e-mail? and did I respond with a firm and gentle, not to say severe, not to say way harsh tone? and did I say unto the panicky student, "Panicky student, you must chill. YOU MUST CHILL."?

The answer to all of these questions is yes. Yes, I did. I wore black and I wore shiny shoes, and I was in charge of the last day of school, lo! the last day of school recognized me and surrendered.

Good lord.

Well, the final work doesn't come in till next week, so it's not like I'm done done, but I am done with the meeting with students, and that feels like, the people, a blessed, blessed relief.

Cheers to blessed, blessed relief.

Milestone.

The last few weeks of this particular semester hold a number of milestones for me. After this semester is over, I will no longer be a faculty leader. I will close up my Open Grievance Shop. (<< not a real thing, but it sure felt like it sometimes!). I will not have a giant lecture to prepare for, nor any presentations to give at conferences small or large. And soon, soon, the grading will be over.

the last meeting was like this, sort of.

Today, I attended my last meeting of the Discussion Team. At this meeting, which I've attended for the last four years--the first two years of the four, I co-chaired it--we discussed (none dare call it negotiated!) salary and working conditions issues for the faculty. The very last meeting, as in never again. 

In honor of this last meeting, I did the following:

(last night) Baked a cake and ate a slice at eleven p.m. 

(this morning) Met with a student | Identified another way that Canvas's sneaky ways have wrought havoc upon my carefully designed end-of-the-semester collaborative project | Ate an artisan (so they say) breakfast sandwich from Starbucks.

 
[THE LAST MEETING]

(after the meeting:) Sat with my colleague in the sun and debriefed | Went back to my office to think about this and that, related to my end-of-the-semester exit plan | Went home | On my way home, stopped at Target and bought a small, many-pocketed backpack for this summer's travels |  Ate some barbeque potato chips. Also a sliver of cake. As you do | And so forth.

Actually, it's sort of shocking how few ceremonies there are to mark the ending of stuff like this. But I am marking it, and how. (--by preparing to grade, at the moment, actually.) And I am feeling pretty good about it, both the having done it and the end of it. 

(balloons  |  parade  |  confetti  |  speeches  |  certificates/plaques | the very, very end.)

Then I was back in it.

The War was on.

Well, not a war, exactly. The closing movement of the semester. We have just concluded the Andante movement, and now we stand, just before the Presto con Fuoco movement begins. The pianist's hands are about the hit the keys. The rubber is about to hit the road.

What I'm trying to say is that I will be consulting with students for the next week and a half.

Here's where I'm going to go ahead and say that when half your students tell you they can't use the Scheduler tool in Canvas (I use the word "tool" with care) to set their consultation appointments, it's frustrating. Sure, frustrating to them too, sure. But to me. It's frustrating to me. I'm frustrated, is what I'm saying, because the kids can't use the tool. Or half of them can't. It's a quandary. It's a dilemma. It's a big fat quandary and a dilemma and a pain in the ass. Sure, a pain in their asses too, sure. But mine. My ass is pained.

This is leaving out the downloading of their million and one files. You know, the files containing the assignments that I gave them.

The good thing is: when the consultations are done, I will have talked with all the students, and their stuff will be read and graded, by me--I'll have read and graded their stuff, personally!--and things will be much much better. So much better that the semester can just slide on down the greased chute that leads from tomorrow to the end, putting on some speed and getting a little dangerous on the turns, but it will be okay. Because I will have talked with all the students, the reading and grading will be done, or done-ish. And that, my friends--THAT, the people--that smells like the end, or as we like to call it at the community college, "summer."

We come to a close.

Today we had our family dinner party. Our house was full of candles and lights and children and beloveds of all ages. As usual, I planned for too much food, but that also meant that there was plenty.

I cooked for three days--just a little on the two days ahead of today--and that meant that, while today was a busy day, it was also manageable. My sons came over and trimmed brussels sprouts, helped me put Christmas wrapping away, swept my floor, and chatted away while we worked.

When we went out at 10:30 to take Bruiser for a walk, I said to the historian, "Well, that's it. That's Christmas. The end."

We both laughed. "I guess so," he said.

It feels good to finish on such a lovely note. We've had a few ups and downs over the holidays, but they've been good nonetheless.




Notes on festive family dinner parties:

1. You really only need two pineapples. Don't panic on the morning of the party and buy an additional two. Or, go ahead. Pineapple is good.
2. Make as much food as you want, but remember that everyone won't eat a huge helping of everything.
3. Go ahead and light all the lights and burn all the candles.
4. Three desserts is not too many, but two would also be fine.
5. An excellent salad is a thing of beauty and a joy forever.
6. Don't think twice about making something extravagant, like a crepe cake, that you've always wanted to make. It's fun! And try a new recipe. Try two! Or five!