We Got Some Wild Wild Life

[All apologies to the Talking Heads...]

Took a trip to the cottage for the Fourth of July weekend (which for us ended on Wednesday night, when we rolled into our driveway at 9pm). Sadly, no pics are available because the digital camera had a dead battery and I forgot the charger. Since it's a Sony Cybershot, and Sony's design is completely ass-backwards, the camera cannot be charged via the USB that connects it to the computer. Our 35mm Canon came along, but as Hubby was appalled at the cost to develop a single roll of film (over $10), he refused to get a CD (a $2 upcharge) and we had 4 rolls...taken on one day.

The cottage is in far northern Wisconsin, a little over an hour from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan (which frankly should just be part of Wisconsin, but what do I know). Hubby planned a surprise trip to the Porcupine Mountains Wilderness Area, and we spent all day Sunday hiking the various trails. My shins are still recovering.

What made it so special was that it was like a mini-honeymoon for us.

On June 23, we celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary. Our original honeymoon was a two-week drive through Minnesota, the Dakotas, the northeast corner of Wyoming (Devil's Tower), and Montana, and it was awesome. We wanted to do something similar for our 10th, but with two kids under 10, it didn't seem like it would work very well (though they are OK for the 225 mile trip to the cottage, I doubt either of them would endure the 14-hour drives we took to get to the various destinations on the original trip). The other issue is one of money--we don't have any to spare this year, and gas and hotels cost money.

So Hubby came up with idea that we'd go to the nearest mountains, which happened to be in the UP. Added bonus were the Union copper mines (we'd spent 3 days in the Black Hills, where there are abandoned exploratory gold mines all over the place).  We hiked up to Lake of the Clouds, and drove to various sites along the south Boundary Road of the wilderness area. We climbed the tower at Summit Peak, which overlooks Lake Superior. It was a really great day--14 hours of just the two of us. And no bears. A few weeks from now, when the blackberries are ripe, that area is bear-tastic.

Wildlife on our lake this year has become more diverse. In addition to the pair of eagles (and their year-old progeny), the great blue herons (who keep pooping on our raft), the pair of loons (and their loonlets--so cute), the mallard family, belted kingfishers, veeries, and thrushes, we have two new species. A pair of common mergansers and a pair of broad-winged hawks have taken up residence:

A muskrat has also made a burrow nearby. Our dock seems to be its favorite place to dismember crappie and bluegill, to judge by the number of fish heads and bones I had to keep cleaning off the beach and dock. We watched it climb up onto the ladder on the raft daily to eat plants (no pics, sadly). Both Things got a big kick out of watching it swim around.

I am so grateful that we have a place like this to retreat from the world. No internet access, no TV, spotty cell service. It's wonderful. Tony's parents bought the land in the summer of 1977, and built the cottage the following year. It's been added on to (now 2 bedrooms!) and his parents have been updating things over the last few years, and all I can say is that we are a very lucky family to have such a marvelous place.

The view from the deck

Poems are coming out of this trip. My soul feels restored, and I'm going to do my best to try to keep it that way.

Summertime, and the Livin's Easy...

...well, sort of. It's easy in the sense that I don't have to prep or teach or grade for 4 classes.  It's not so easy in the sense that since my contract is paid on a 9-month basis, summer means no money coming in on my end of things until October. Hubby works 50+ hours/week, so we are able to pay rent, utilities, car payments*, and food, but everything else is a tight squeeze which depends completely on how much I've been able to save during the spring months (this year, not much--daycare at $850/month ate a quarter of my monthly take-home pay). I put my student loans (currently hovering around $70,000) in deferment from May-October because the $450 I'm paying per month just isn't doable on Hubby's salary.

*Car payments: Right now, we don't have one, because I killed my Honda Element the morning of graduation (5/20). 

Luckily I wasn't seriously hurt. A mild case of whiplash, a concussion, and a bad bruise on my left knee. The light pole I hit in the campus parking lot was impervious to any damage, as I was only going 15 mph (our lot gets lots of HS students who zoom through it, and I had been eyeing one such carload while making the curve through the lot--the officer who took my report told me that he's almost hit the pole too, because it's hard to see).

So I'm driving my mother-in-law's 1996 Toyota Camry (no a/c, and a cassette deck but it gets great gas mileage) and I'm lucky to have it. We have to go minivan shopping this weekend, and I'm not really looking forward to it. I loved my Element, and I'm sorry I killed it. 

Due to the accident, I barely got my grades done in time to meet the system deadline. Grading creative writing portfolios while on muscle relaxants and Percocet made for interesting (and extremely slow) reading. I only hope that my comments make sense when the few students who requested feedback come to pick up their portfolios in the fall. The writing was really good--a bit of a surprise, given how little most of them participated in class discussions.

I only had one case of blatant plagiarism in my lit course, and it was a head-shaker because the students knew I would be checking because I told them I would be checking. The instructions on the assignment explicitly forbade using the internet for the paper (which was on Leslie Marmon Silko's novel Ceremony--and there are about a bajillion websites--Academon, Free Student Papers, etc.--that have papers on the novel). This is the same assignment as the previous time I taught the course (Spring 2008) with the same warning (I had one case of plagiarism then, too--the student showed absolutely no remorse). I ran string searches on every single paper, and wouldn't you know it? One student pulled the first paragraph of her paper off a review of the novel. I stopped reading, printed off the website, paper-clipped it to the back of her paper, and wrote NG (no grade) on the first page. I simply do not understand the behavior in light of the explicit warning. Do they think I'm bluffing? That I'll be too busy to check? "No Grade" is a 0 on a 150 point assignment, a virtual guarantee of a failing grade for the course. The student came to see me afterwards, and simply said "I don't know why I did it--it's not like you didn't give us enough material in class to use for the paper. I guess I shouldn't have done it." I nodded and sent her on her way. *Sigh.* I hope she learned from this...but I can't guarantee it.

Summer hasn't quite started yet--although the weather is finally warming up--because Thing One is still in first grade until next Thursday. Thing Two and I are having some one-on-one time. He enjoys "'nuggles" (snuggling with me and his blankie) and taking his shoes off right after I've put them on. And now that Dinosaur Train ("Choo Choo ROAR!") is over, it's time for me to end this post. Up next: my summer reading list.

The Beginning of the End...of Summer

August 1st. Sunday. Hot. Sunny. Appropriate beginning to the final weeks of summer "vacation". 

To say that I am not looking forward to going back to work would be untrue: I am looking forward to seeing all of my colleagues at the opening meeting on the 26th, and I look forward to meeting my latest batch of minds.

I look forward to being able to update this blog without having to get up to

• take DVDs/thumbdrives/pens/tape dispensers/remotes/power cords/grown-up books away from Thing Two
• get Thing Two off the cat, who is screeching in protest at being hugged
• pick the box fan up after Thing Two has knocked it over for the third time

all of which I have had to do in the last 10 minutes while trying to corral my skittering thoughts. Forget it. I'm mixing a UV Blue and lemonade, and I'm going outside to lounge and celebrate the Beginning of the End of Another Summer. I encourage you to do the same.

Be well, everyone.

Perspektiv: I Haz It

The weekend was really good--I was able to get back on an even keel with Thing One. She's really an amazing kid--smart, funny, and full of energy. I'm a lucky mom to have her. 

Right now, I'm watching Thing Two demolish a slice of watermelon from his perch on the chair at the kitchen table--a perch he has learned to climb this past week. Further grey hairs are on their way.

I missed my department summer gathering this weekend--we just had too many projects going on around here. Hubby is building a kiln to dry lumber, and our garden and yard were in sore need of some tending.

So we spent the weekend together, and it was good. When I imagined married life with kids, this weekend was what I pictured: working on separate projects, then coming together to chat and eat and just be. Sunday morning involved me getting to sleep in until 8:00, rising for coffee and time to write on the deck before having blueberry pancakes. 

I had a brainstorm of ideas for a YA novel just before I fell asleep on Saturday night, and have filled 4 pages of my 9x12 sketchbook with ideas, including a rough outline for the plot.

Considering that I haven't ever written anything longer than a 6-page short story (once) and my usual medium is poetry, this represents a major change and challenge.  It is going to require quite a bit of research (which I will confess right now is very appealing to me) and collaboration with hubby, whose knowledge of woodsmithing, metallurgy, and machinery will be invaluable.


Coming as it does during the final stage of my bid for tenure, I am wondering if my brain is trying to sabotage me. I went to the Art Institute of Chicago for an MFA in Creative Writing 13 years ago, and NOW I have good ideas?! ARGH.


In other news, I will be sending out my chapbook again at the end of the week, along with a couple of poems for an upcoming anthology about growing up in Ohio. Hopefully at least one of the Ohio poems will be accepted. 

I grew up one mile from Brandywine Falls.  If you're ever in the Cleveland/Akron area, you definitely should check it out. 


And now, back to my regularly scheduled programming: laundry, dishes, prepping dinner (since we'll be at Thing One's very first swimming lesson tonight!), and playing with Thing One and Thing Two.


Life is very, very good.

Motivation, or Lack Thereof

Today was pretty much a bust in the doing-things department. It was overcast/intermittently raining (after 2.2" yesterday) and humid and 75 degrees at 6:45 this morning, so that wasn't the best start to the day. Hubby only left me one lousy cup of coffee when he left for work, and I was too lazy/unmotivated to make more.

Got one load of laundry (Thing Two's) done. Well, washed, anyway. It'll make it into the dryer before it has a chance to mold, if only because he's completely out of shorts.

His mama's out of sorts.

I'm so tired of dealing with Thing One's 6 going-on-15 attitude. I don't enjoy being home, and it kills me to admit it. I'm supposed to be happy to be at home--lots of parents (moms and dads alike) would love to have the summer to spend at home, but not me. Nooooo. If I could afford it, I'd send her to summer camp, which she would probably like better than being with me anyway. Thing Two is a mama's boy, so no problem there, except that he's learning from his sister. Her attitude is, to quote Garth from Wayne's World, "sucking my will to live."

I'm starting to wonder if she has ODD, because she argues with me about E V E R Y T H I N G. Literally. Not joking. We had lunch today with one of my former students, and at one point she turned to me and said "Wow, she has an answer for everything, doesn't she?"

It's exhausting. I finally let her watch The Princess and the Frog while her brother and I took a nap this afternoon, and when we got up, it started all over again. I can't be out of the room for more than 10 seconds when Thing Two starts yelling "No, no!" She won't leave him alone and she argues the finer points of what she's done, and argues about how long she'll have to be in Time Out.

I used to joke that I was raising the next U.S. Attorney General, but it's starting to not be funny anymore.

 

Midway Through the Summer

It's nearly the end of July. Woke up to more rain/fog, which has thankfully begun to burn off.

Thing One is at my feet looking through the movies I spilled onto the floor while updating my new profile. Thing Two is napping; otherwise, I would not be able to write this.

I titled the blog "This Academic Life" because I am an assistant professor in my last few months of a tenure bid. I do not know how it is going to turn out. My votes have been uncomfortably close for the past two years (not coincidentally, Thing Two was born 19 months ago, on the last day of my finals). I love my job. Well, I love most aspects of my job, which makes me way luckier than most people. I love teaching, I love meeting with students, and as sick as it may sound, I love meetings with my colleagues (not just in my department, but across my campus as well).

That last part is partly why I am in the precarious position today--I over-extended myself on committee obligations (chairing committees during a tenure bid is not something I would recommend), which left me with no time and little energy for writing.

The Inside Higher Ed blogger Kerry Ann Rockquemore has an advice column called "Winning Tenure Without Losing Your Soul". Some of what she has to say is common sense (but since when did anyone in academia have a surplus of that??). Some of it doesn't take into account a variety of factors. Consider this post in which she gives parameters for a 40-hour work week. Her 40-hour work week is 20 hours for research and writing; the rest divided into hours for teaching (12) and prep (she gives 4) and committee/service obligations.

Nowhere in that post does she make time for grading. I do not have a TA upon whom I can dump 66 3-5 page papers that need to be graded within 10 "working" days. So if I want to have a 40-hour week (and I SO want one), I have to "eat" hours out of something else. Can't eat them out of class time. Can't eat them out of prep, since my courses get tweaked almost every semester to make them better. Can't eat them out of service. So I guess I'll eat them out of writing time. Guess how many hours it takes to grade 66 papers? Give up?

About 21 hours, give or take.

That's right. The papers vary widely in both content and quality, and each must be carefully read (once for content, once for quality). Each must have comments written both on the paper itself, and on a rubric given back with the paper.

She also left out office hours (6 per week) but I guess since a lot of us do prep at that time, those qualify as multi-tasking hours.

What about the summer? you ask.

Great question!

I have two children under age 6, and I don't get paid over the summer. Guess what that means? It means that I'm home from 6:00 am to 6:00 pm with two small children. Have you ever tried to write anything coherent while being chattered at by a 6 yr old and a 19 month old? No? It's an exercise in futility.

Then the NY Times comes out with

What if College Tenure Dies?

And I'm sitting here...

Ah well. I'm gainfully employed (for now) and I have managed to get some writing done in the past few weeks. The kids are going to stay with Grandma and Grandpa for a few days next week, and I will have time to work on my article. I even have a place to send it, so hopefully all will be well.