Goodbye, Christmas

The last few years,  being completely on my own, has made Christmas complicated for me. For one, when it's just me and Nehi I find introverted self just happy to have time off with no people and sweatpants.

The last few years as I've pared down, done more with less, I've applied this minimalism outlook to the holidays. I do not spend thousands on things. I try to be mindful. It helps that I have friends and family that I don't really ever know what to get them so it's been easy to send them New Mexican food- spices, dips, soups as gifts. I also stopped having a tree for a while. At the time the idea of spending money on- what? just seemed ridiculous.

Too, a lot of this is all tied up with my Mom. Despite not being a practicing Christian, Christmas was her holiday. It started as soon as you saw Santa at the end of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. The tree went up the next day and was decorated. Dozens, and dozens, and DOZENS of cookies got made. Presents filled the space under the tree. The Christmas movie marathon was 24 hours a day. For my Mom, Christmas was magical. And she was often unwilling to let go of her magical time with the tree often staying up well past it being a fire hazard- past the twelve days, deep into January, one year I seem to recall it still being up on my birthday on February 3rd.

Mom was a dreamer, and while she never articulated this, I think the reason the season was magical to her, appealed to her so much was because it had the potential to make people better.

She believed in the lesson of It's a Wonderful Life, that if given the chance people would rally, do what's right, give to others, be better.
For her, whose life was hard, and never lived up to what she dreamt for herself, the magic of the season was the magic of possibility.

After she died, I had a really hard time with Christmas. The first year after I recreated everything she had done. No one but me seemed to care, or even notice. The couple of years after I tried, but my heart wasn't in it. Then I was out in Albuquerque, on my own, and I honestly didn't see the point. One year I decorated, but was so over it all that the tree came down Christmas morning and I packed everything away.

Last year I think I pulled out a few decorations and bought a wreath but that was it. I pulled way back. I also stopped feeling like I had to keep up with some ridiculously god-like power of getting the perfect gift, spending enough money to prove- hell, I don't know. I went simple. One book, one thing I knew people would like, one fun thing, food for extended family.

This year I am in my own house, so it seemed silly and somehow wrong NOT to decorate. I had both the space and time to pull everything out and look at it, toss junk I'd been carting around for years, more carefully store some things, pull out what I wanted. 

I listened to Christmas music while I did it and it was fun.

Last night I looked at Nehi, with her wagging tail hitting the lower branches and knocking the ornaments, and wondered what the hell I was doing.

There was no family gathering to decorate the tree. No ceremony, no celebration the way there was with Mom. In fact all the decorating was a fairly robotic unpacking and just putting things out. There was no satisfaction, no magic, no love in any of it. I enjoyed choosing presents for people this year- big food baskets for the extended, some fun things for godparents, and more immediate family. Presents for a friend were not a surprise but exactly what she wanted, so happiness on that one.

I looked at the ornaments on the tree, many of which are as old as I am, others that trace our childhood, ones made in class, handmade creations of Popsicle sticks and hardened (rotted?) gingerbread. There's the little dragon Mom got me my first Christmas after college. The Glinda the Good Witch. The Star Wars themed ornaments from a couple years ago Dad got me.

And all of a sudden sitting on the couch, staring at all this I was crushed, weighed down, overcome by the past, by the idea that there was nothing alive about any of those things. They were a simulcrum of things past, holding only distant echoes of whatever experience, or emotions they once were. I wondered why I had put the ornaments out. I looked at the minimal decorations I had put out and suddenly decided I did not want to do Christmas anymore.

• St. Nicholas was a Christian bishop that cared for the needy. His saint's day is 6 December, the day after Krampusnacht yet that day, and the season surrounding it is not about giving to the needy. It has become a "keeping up with the Joneses," "push people down over that year's hot toy" capitalistic hellscape. People may pay lip service to caring for those less fortunate, but they don't actually do anything. Thanksgiving and Christmas are big days for volunteering at food pantries, and many get in those last tax deductable donations before the new year, but how many people who claim to be Christians are carrying their faith, the message of their religion, into the world, and providing a model? Certainly the hypocrites who are fine with kids in cages have no problem unironically putting up their creche. I know the racist down the street who complains about "those Mexicans" was the first in our neighborhood to put out her Christmas decorations.

• The popular culture image of Santa, his duties, and his reindeer, have their origins an 1823 poem. It is here that he is identified as an elf, and has elves that work from him, borrowing from the Nisse and Tomte tradition. The image of Father Christmas in England and Santa in North America comes mostly from the cartoonist Thomas Nast whose 1881 illustration, Merry Old Santa, featured a plump man in a red-suit, with a pipe and a rosy complexion, although the image below appeared in 1868 and was not about the needy or giving but marketing. 

Coca-Cola did not invent this image of Santa but their version certainly became the most recognizable one moving forward.

But as Eddie Izzard says- what's all this got to do with the birth of Jesus Christ in a manger?

Nothing. Nada. Zip.

When I moved here I went to drop off my parish paperwork, and then go to Mass. Instead I went home. I had interviewed at a religious school and one of the biggest questions I had was whether or not my morals would allow me to teach at a place that foundationally told many students that their presence was a sin, that they were abominations. The people were nice, and I really liked them, but this question haunted me. Ultimately they chose someone else so I was saved my moral choice. But this is why I stopped going to Mass. I loved the comfort, the history, the weight, of the Catholic Church but I could no longer stand in front of students and in any way justify being a part of an institution that had done so much wrong and judged my students so horribly.

So, if we take the "Christ out of Christmas" which Christians in the culture wars SWEAR is the agenda, versus the Supreme Court which declared Christmas trees were secular, what does that leave us with?

When I was growing up as atheist/agnostic (Mom taught me about Santa, but not Jesus, and we never went to church) I always felt ostracized by the seeming-decoder ring aspect of Christianity, the quizzes, the scorn, the constant feeling that I was an outsider, and out of place not just because I did not go to church three times a week and Vacation Bible School, but also because I was fairly loud, even as a child, about the fact that we should NOT have daily prayer in public school, that there shouldn't be Christmas trees, or religious carols, in a public school setting (yeah, I was REAL popular). Even when I converted to Catholicism in college, I never thought these things belonged in a public school or university setting because I would never want a student to feel like I once did. My faith was my faith, but it was private.

So, I circle back to thinking maybe my mom had it right. I think it comes back to wanting to believe people can be better, for needing some magic in the world, and wanting to believe in the power of redemption. Maybe it's simply Seasonal Affective Disorder and we all need a little light this time of year. 

But what does that mean? In A Christmas Carol, and all its revisions, like Scrooged, a closed off old man is shown the error of his ways, repents, and dedicates his life to doing better. Someone on Twitter the other day wondered why there was no Scrooge-type movie starring Donald Trump, and the answer is simple, there is no hope for his redemption, he does not want it, he does not think he needs it. He is proud of what he has done, and who he is. He'd probably ask the ghosts to prove citizenship and then tweet his complaints about them breaking into his penthouse.

Perhaps a better example of what the season can be is the 2000 movie The Family Man starring Nicholas Cage and Téa Leoni. Jack is not a bad man, well, not really. He is not cruel, he does not fire people, or scream, ruin their lives. He is a businessman, in true Wall Street style, who is focused on having and displaying that he has the best life can offer. He makes people work on Christmas, but believes the deal they'll score is the best gift. While it's tangentially a Scrooge revision, there are some notable differences. Cash, as played by Don Cheadle, offers Jack a "glimpse" of what his life could have been if he'd just made a single different choice. There are no ghosts and the "glimpse" lasts past Valentine's Day so the plot is more Sliding Doors than A Christmas Carol as Jack is allowed to live out the life he would have had if he had not left his college sweetheart. Christmas may be what enables the magic but it is not the center of the story.

The center of the story is the love between Jack and Kate. The life they have, the happiness, the joy. Yes, it is not the life Jack had, or imagined he wanted (I mean, it DOES take place in Jersey...just kidding!) It is a life of budgets, and getting by, but it's not poverty, and the life he has with Kate and their two children is a good one.

In fact the only real fight Jack and Kate have in the glimpse is about him complaining what their life could have been versus what it is and Kate's response is, "You know, it's sad to hear that your life is such a disappointment." She is perfectly happy with their life, and the Jack she knows, not the one who is having his "glimpse," is too.

In this way the movie pushes against easy comparisons to It's a Wonderful Life. Jack does learn his lesson. He does grow. He realizes that what could make him happy in life is not material goods. George Bailey does not learn anything. Out of everything he sees, what makes him decide this world without him cannot abide is that Mary is fine without him- single and working, but apparently fine.

Twitter has a lot of fun with the fact that the "fate worse than anything" that George sees is Mary being single and a librarian (sounds heavenly to me).

Growing up, long before NBC made it a thing, this was the movie we watched on Christmas Eve. Mom loved it, again because I think it reinforced her idea of redemption and magic and the survival of the human spirit. I grew up thinking the community coming together was not only magical but just how communities should be. I knew Potter was evil, not just for stealing the money, but because he ONLY seemed interested in money, putting greed over people as a default not an exception. But as I grew up, the magic of the movie did not hold up.

First, there's George Bailey, who's pretty much a douchebag to everyone in his life. He makes his choices, he chooses family and community, but then makes everyone around him pay for these choices. He's short with his children, abusive to his wife Mary, and resentful of his brother not paying his own family dues. George Bailey is selfish and unkind. The movie wants the audience to see him as a victim, but as I grew up I saw in him a hundred people I knew who were miserable in their own lives because of their own choices, and then turned around and made every single person around them miserable, as though everyone had to be dragged down with them. George does not pull his own weight in his family, he claims martyr status and then leaves the work of the family and home to Mary. He is not a good father or a good husband. Yet after placing everyone's future's in jeopardy, he is not just saved, he is rewarded, literally presented as the savior of the town without whom all would be lost, and he gets money on top of all this, his sins and behaviors seemingly forgotten by all.

As an adult too much of the movie doesn't hold up. The lessons fray when held up to the light. 

A lot of the magical movies my mother loved are the same. Holiday Inn has that horrific blackface scene and features a love triangle with fairly manipulative men viewing the woman as a trophy. It still bugs me that Scrooge faces no consequences for all the damage he's done. One Magic Christmas seems a little too cruel to teach the lesson of Christmas, although Harry Dean Stanton's Gideon makes me cry. Santa Claus the Movie seems ridiculous, and like someone lost a pitch bet. Kevin McCallister is annoying as shit. I used to love the Grinch, and the Whovilles (Mom always called it roast beast) but too many live action movie money grabs have made even the Whos down in Whoville lose their luster. The claymation crew- Santa, Rudolph, Frost, with each iteration seem less than, and honestly Elf co-opting all of it tarnished them as well.

Nowadays, I just don't watch them. Each viewing seemed to strip them of their magic in my memories more and more so I decided to let them cling to what glitter is still left and pack them away. Scrooged seems safe, as does National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. Gremlins, Die Hard, these seem safe. You cannot take Charlie Brown's Christmas Special and the magical music of the Vince Guaraldi Trio away from me (but Imma gonna ignore the very troublesome religious play in the middle of a public school with no adult supervision). I did used to like when television shows I watched did Christmas themed shows but now they're all on break from November to February, so no more of that.

When I was in high school there was a counselor, who went onto be a teacher, who wore a Christmas sweater, earrings, and necklace and bracelet every day from when we got back from Thanksgiving until we were out for winter break (which by the way, everyone called Christmas break). It always made me smile, and when I taught high school I scoured Goodwill after the holidays and shopped online for funny, often pop-culture related gear. Soon I too had a sweater for every day (although I skipped the accessorizing). The students seems to think it was funny and it made an often hard time of the semester easier, or brighter maybe.

But this year, as I railed against there being a Christmas tree up in a public institution with no other religions representations to be seen, I started to rethink my holiday wear. Yes, many of them were penguins, and polar bears, and dogs in sleighs, all clearly secular winter themed subjects. But there is the Gremlins one, the AT Walker on Hoth, both of which are secular, kinda? Hoth definitely is. And then there's my favorite Nakatomi Christmas Party 1988 sweatshirt. Secular- maybe? The cat sweater that says Merry Meowmas, definitely not. The Island of Misfit Toys tee with "Misfits" written like the band? Not sure what argument I'd make there. Again, happy to make people smile, but I wouldn't any student to see me, what I'm wearing, and think for any reason that I would not be accepting of them, listen to them, value them, teach them. So I'm thinking next year I'll just make students' days bright finals week by offering them chocolate (wait, are red, green, and silver Hershey's kisses non-denominational?)

So if I don't want the holiday wear, the historic ornaments, the commercialism, the movies, my deep thought last night was, why do I even celebrate Christmas?

Peer pressure.

It's everywhere.

Think I get shit for telling people I don't celebrate Thanksgiving? Try telling them that about Christmas. The onslaught begins even before Thanksgiving, in Lowe's the Christmas displays were up alongside the pumpkins and Halloween decorations.

Americans have erased other holiday traditions and religious holidays from the winter calendar and the popular imagination, Eight Crazy Nights not withstanding. Asking for parity is almost always greeted with accusations of you starting a "War on Christmas" and "Hating Santa" and something-something culture wars.

So I wondered, having listed all the things I just can't make myself do anymore, what exactly DO I want to do?

Rumor has it we have Martin Luther to thank for indoor trees, and ignoring the religious context, I love the idea that "Walking toward his home one winter evening, composing a sermon, he was awed by the brilliance of stars twinkling amidst evergreens. To recapture the scene for his family, he erected a tree in the main room and wired its branches with lighted candles." 

I do think that offering brightness of light during the darkest of seasons is a good thing. So I'll keep my blue and white snowflake outdoor lights. 

And I do love the way the house smells with balsam wreaths and a balsam tree. But I think my tree lights will be white. I think the ornaments with the weighed down history and narratives will get put away, for good, in their boxes (although as the single, childless keeper of the history through tchotchkes and knick-knacks I do often wonder who I'm keeping all these things safe for).

I think keeping with the theme of a light in darkness I'll decorate with white and silver and gold stars, and snowflakes, and suns, and reindeer.

I think I'll put Mom's Grinch music box but no longer put up her stocking.

I think I'll put out the candle holders that look like something from Krypton.

I think I'll give to charities of underrepresented groups, both for myself, and buy gifts from these creators for presents.

I think I'll make more of an effort to support small businesses, not big conglomerates as I make consumer decisions.

I think I'll be mindful of what would bring light to friends and family in dark days, and what is mindful and impactful, as I consider presents.

I think I will not send Christmas cards, but maybe send a select few winter-themed cards to catch some people, true friends, up on what I'm doing, and because real mail is magic.

I think practically I'll decorate during Genocide Break because we're off, and take it all down before I go back to work.

I think I will try to believe in redemption, that every day is a chance to make things better, and try to be the best person I can be, today, this season, and every day.

I think there are worst ways to go.

One Pagers at the End of the Semester

It would not be an exaggeration to say that One Pagers are one of my most favorite-est pedagogical activities. Hand 20, 30, 40 year old students colored paper and markers and crayons and ask them to answer "What did you learn this semester" using their notes, syllabus, and class readings and you are in for some magic.

I somehow (I blame being sick) totally spaced on doing these with my comp students. I meant to have them do them Monday and Tuesday while I grade conferenced with folks, and I just plumb forgot.

My upper level classes DID all do them. I had the Brit Lit Survey and Shax classes do them a couple of weeks ago because I thought it'd be a good refresher as they thought through their unessays. For the class I ended up covering I did it the last day as a positive way to end the class.

Here's my I love One Pagers and why I think you should do them:

• It encourages students to go back through the syllabus, their notes, and the readings and reflect and consider these things through the perspective of big picture at the end of the semester
• You will be AMAZED at what sticks with students. For example, almost ALL my survey students mentioned that Norse =/= Vikings. Also, I apparently throw my hands up like Hell Elmo when I express to them what Hwaet means.

• Drawing is magical. Creating One Pagers is the most focused I ever see my students. They look up reference pictures, they agonize over choosing marker colors. They are INVESTED. I don't think we allow enough of this in classes in general, but especially in college classes.

• I only ask the students to create One Page that represents "what I learned this semester." There are no other guidelines or rules. Each student does it differently. Some prefer lists. Some collages. Some will densely pack their pages, while some like negative space. I think these types of assignments with few restrictions, where the students figure out what is needed, are incredibly valuable. I also think they're great for showing you HOW your students think. Who draws? Who looks things up? Who prefers to depend on text?

• Your students will reveal quirks you did not know you had. If there are phrases you use over and over, those will pop out. When I taught my fairy tale course the phrase "Everything's a penis" popped up again and again. In my defense, we were using psychoanalytic theory and Dundes a lot. The one below is from the class I covered the last two months, where I pretty much spent two weeks telling them all not to panic and that it was all going to be okay.

• It's also really helpful for seeing what students find the most helpful. I teach students to color code their essay drafts: yellow for thesis and topic sentences, green for evidence, blue for explaining how that evidence shows your thesis, and pink for citations. It helps them "see" what they're missing and not.

• Not ALL journalistic citation is bad. BUT my students often have a hard time standing strong with their statements. They couch terms, use passive voice, and emphasize their sources over their own arguments, "Dr. Smith argues that..."  I work hard to get them to use and interact with their sources in order to make THEIR argument

• Something that came up again and again in the cover letters of the composition writing folders was some variation of "I learn better when the teacher believes in me." I think it can be easy for us to forget how much believing in our students, as people, and as learners, can mean to them. I think also stressing that their self-worth, and worth as a person, has nothing to do with what grades they earn is really important.

• And finally, it never hurts to hear this...

I actually want to do more of these, earlier in the semester. For example, early in the course it'd be great to have them do a One Pager on what they think the class is about based on the syllabus. I'd be able to see HOW they responded as well as what stuck out on a cold reading.
I think too it's be helpful to have them do them at the end of chunks/modules, to see what they got, what didn't, especially for filling gaps as we move forward. I'm thinking specifically of doing this in my Gender and Lit class in the spring.

While my composition classes did not do one pagers, they did cover letters for their writing portfolios. There were some things that came up again and again.

• They all recognized that the workshop time in class was key (even if they didn't always take advantage of it).
• The relationships I built with them, the class culture we had, was noticeable and appreciated by almost all
• They really "got" the grade conferences, how it helped, how to use it and really liked them
• They clearly understood the essential questions AND what genre was, and what elements made up genre, and rhetorical situations, and how tone, audience, and purpose changes depending on who you were writing for
• Their favorite assignments were:
• Analyzing "Apeshit"/"This is America" to write Rolling Stones articles
• Their final assignment, designing infographic of their choice on any topic they wanted
• A lot liked the historical marker memo, learning about the place they were going to school in

There are some things I need to remember to do and do better in the spring:

• Stress and require that they take notes on the feedback they receive
• Design like a cheatsheet for grade conferences. While I wasn't going to argue with a student about a grade there were a couple of times where I liked the work but it didn't do several key things. A checklist of some sort will help them prepare assignments AND provide clearer criteria for me
• As the end of the semester neared I slacked on putting material on class notes slides. I need to do better about keeping these up and being detailed
• I also want to do a better job of drawing connections between mentor texts and assignments

Like I blogged earlier, I think overall, given that it was my first semester and there were a lot of moving parts, that it was a good first semester. These results seem to bear that out. I'll be interested to compare the official university course evaluations with these.

Anyway, hand your students some crayons. Give them a day to draw.

Trust me, you'll thank me later.

A Professor's First Semester/Year Schedule

A lot of conversations about academia revolve around work. How much one does, under what conditions. Who gets assigned what work. How these work decisions are racist, gendered. Does this work lead to what is valued- publications, or is it spent on "softer" goals, like teaching.

There's a lot of work in the first semester of a new professor. You need to learn about your students. You need to learn about your department and colleagues. You need to learn about your campus. You need to learn about your community. All that is on top of your other responsibilities.

I recently blogged about my reflections on my first semester but I thought I'd share specifically, my work this semester.

I struggled a lot at the beginning of the semester on how to organize my work, how to manage it all.
I ended up getting a planner from Amazon that has monthly and weekly sheets. I like how big it is. I put things on the monthly, then on Sunday mornings when I lesson plan I look at the month layout and put what I need to on the next week's pages.

I like that I can put to do stuff up top and timed/schedule appointments at the bottom. I like to use stickers, color coded pens. Weeks often end up layered as I add Post-Its, thoughts, comments, things to do.

My schedule this semester was this:

Monday, Wednesday, and Friday were my long days. Tuesday/Thursdays were lighter. My school blocks out TR afternoons for meetings, which is nice for planning and scheduling things. It also meant on days I didn't have meetings I was done when I went home at 1p. My spring schedule is real similar- MWF are my long days, although I'm going to have to shift my lunch, which may be an issue, I may be eating in class. I will have a longer break in the afternoon, returning for a 4p class, which I may need to get creative with because I noticed THIS semester my 3p class has issues with attendance (many said they'd go back to rooms after earlier classes and sleep, or space out and forget or lack the energy to come back for class), and energy.

I added funny pictures of Nehi, because the students get a real hoot out of the fact that I put on my schedule "Run home to let Nehi out."

This semester I surveyed students to have them pick my office hours, and they picked what I would have chosen- time in between classes. The upcoming semester's schedule doesn't really allow me this flexibility because Nehi really can't be home more than 6 hours, so I've gotta go home. However, I did try to keep the type of hours that seemed to work with students, before and between classes. I don't have any classes on Tuesday and Thursday, in part because one of my committees is recruitment and this allows for those events. BUT I need to hold 10 hours in my office, and so I have to hold them on those days. I've made them in the afternoon, right before campus meetings. If I don't have any scheduled I'll do my hours and go home. If I do, I'll do my hours and then meetings. I just bought a bike, and it's only about 3 miles to work, so I'm going to try to start biking to and from work on TR as long as it's not going to rain.

I am currently on the general education committee, teaching advisory committee, recruitment for university, assessment, program coordinators, composition. Most are scheduled during this 330p break but this semester I missed some because they did not meet during this time and with full teaching days MWF, I don't have a lot of flexibility. It hasn't seemed to be an issue so far, so I hope that continues to be true.

This semester I got up most mornings between 5 and 6a. I had coffee, watched the news, and at 630a took Nehi for her walk (about a mile). I then dropped her off at home and went for an addition 2+ miles walk or run on my own. I'd shower, get ready for work, eat breakfast, and leave my house by 8a to get into the office. I liked having the hour or so to answer emails and get everything sorted before I taught all day.

On Tuesday and Thursdays I learned whether I came home after 1p for the day or had to return to campus I learned to take this time off. Nehi and I would play. or I'd watch TV, but that's it.

I do schedule everything, so on Friday on my way home from work I grocery shop. When I get home I do laundry. On Saturdays and Sundays I follow the same morning routine- up around 5 or 6, coffee, walk Nehi, walk or run, although now I've added riding my bike to this. Then back home, breakfast, and I head into my home office.

I balance my checkbook, check email, Twitter, then work on academic stuff. I had two chapters I submitted before the semester started, so my Saturdays were pretty light this semester. I did this on purpose because I knew there would be a lot else going on. I did have Saturdays when I had revise and resubmit stuff to turn around and I did.

Sundays are the same morning routine, NPR classical goes on, or I catch up on dumping the DVR of shows I don't have to pay attention to, which it is depends on how much thinking I need to do for Sunday's work. I lesson plan for the week. First I look at the syllabus week by week, then add to class notes on Slides, flesh out my notes in my notebook. I'm always done by noon, then I switch to reading, listening to vinyl, or whatever, just off. I have Nehi, so I wet glove the couch of fur and vacuum every Sunday. Eastern North Carolina weather equals mud plus fur so I sweep about once a week too. I don't own a lot, a result of getting rid of a ridiculous amount of stuff, so I use just about everything I own so dusting is not a big issue. Once a month we have time off, a long weekend or break- Labor Day, fall break, Genocide Week, winter break, so during that time I dust, vacuum, sweep, mop, clean the bathroom, the whole deal. It all gets done, and is fine.

Nehi helps with work-life balance by bringing me woobies to play with when she thinks I've been in the office too long.

I am not a morning person, never have been, I get up at 5a because Nehi thinks 6a is sleeping in. I get up at 5a because I need 2 cups of coffee and zone out time before I am functioning. I walk Nehi then walk or run or bike myself because I like starting my day in that quiet, when the neighborhood is barely moving. I plan essays, think of things to do in classes, solutions bubble to the surface to things that have been playing in the background. All this allows me to face my day with a clear head and relaxed body. During the cooler months I try to walk Nehi when I get home from work too, I let her out for potty breaks at lunch, but she is home alone all day. When I get home I can relax because I know I've scheduled time to get everything done so I don't feel guilty because I should be working on X. If I finish an academic project early on Saturday then I get to take the rest of the day off, because I'd blocked the whole day off to work.

All of this allows me to get done what I need to do and rest and recharge from dealing with people all day.

I do not check work email on nights or weekends. It is not loaded on my phone. I've done this for years after checking email during these times resulted in awful anxiety. I no longer feel anxious but still don't check it for balance and time off. However, because I no longer feel anxious, if I need to log into email on Sunday for something needed for lesson planning I no longer stress.

Weekends are also when I blog about things that have occurred to me during the week.

My work load is not excessive. I get everything done. I publish regularly. I manage all my responsibilities and don't burn out.

This semester I used Freshly meal delivery because I knew the semester would be busy and thought it'd help. I do love their food, and for a single person it was nice because making meals can be hard as a singleton because literally NOTHING is designed for single portions and even freezing, eating more than once a week, it's not ideal. For me the price was reasonable too. However, I've cancelled my subscription for none of these reasons, and for a reason that probably wouldn't be an issue for anyone else. I don't eat a lot of processed foods, I eat salads, whole foods, so I don't eat sugar unless it's intentional (hmmmm, pie...hmmmm mint chocolate chip ice cream...) and I consumer no salt. But these meals contain 700-1100 mg of sodium, which is 30% of daily recommended dose, which isn't bad unless you're someone who never eats salt and whose hands have been swelling for roughly the same time as she's been eating these meals.

So I'm taking a break to see if it helps. If not, at least I've crossed something off the list.

For me this won't add a lot of work for me because like I said, it's just me, and most dinners are salads so it's not hard work or a lot of prep although this romaine lettuce recall is a real bummer.

The caveat of course with all this is that I am a single woman, with a dog, so I'm only juggling my schedule and Nehi's vet appointments. I've found that not only is this a manageable schedule but a good life. There is balance. I am busy, I am juggling a lot but I am not overwhelmed.

I do not share this to brag or judge people that have busier lives.

I write this for the same reason I blog about most things- if my sharing and examples help anyone, either in providing a model, or just to show there's another way, then great.

What's important is to design your schedule around what you can and want to do. What will make you happy and keep you healthy. My way is not for everyone but I think there are some suggestions that might transfer:

• Find a planner/organizer that works for you. Put everything in it and carry it everywhere. 
• Before your semester starts create a schedule that includes when you teach, regular meetings, but also when you'll work on your scholarship, grocery shop, do laundry, and clean. Block out time for the things you need to get done.
• Take your work email off your phone. Set boundaries for when you'll check it. No nights and no weekends is a good place to start and students and other faculty members will get it.
• If there are things that will help you then do it. Use meal delivery. Hire a cleaning lady. Or dog walker. Say no to things you don't want to do and can say no to. Learn to live with untidy spaces. Put stickers in your planner.
• Figure out what you value, then make time for that.
• Share if things work for you. A lot of things I've tried out and experimented with came from other people sharing on Twitter or on blogs.

I Survived My First Semester

It is hard to believe that my first semester as an assistant professor is almost done. Today and tomorrow are the last days before the students have break, then they come back and Monday and Tuesday are the last days of class before reading day and final exams.

Overall I would say it's been a really good semester although there has been a very steep learning curve for a variety of reasons. Before the semester started I was asked to be program coordinator and to teach 5 classes instead of 4 because of last minute adjunct issues. The program coordinator thing was a big deal mostly because it's schedule and assessment, two very big things. I do like doing it though because I get to work with students, listen to things they need and help.
For the last two months I've covered a 6th class when a professor had to be out.

There are things I REALLY, REALLY like about my job. I like advising students. I like running the FAST Fund. I LOVE teaching my classes (all of them). I also like running the department Twitter account.

I struggle with the things I have always struggled with, misreading or not reading social cues, inadvertently stepping on toes, anything political. I also really struggle with people using deficit language or not being engaged in teaching, or seeing their students.

I think I've done okay with managing my time, although the constant required trainings that were never scheduled far in advance made some weeks more hectic than others. I think I just have one more day in January and then I think I'm done. There has been a lot of service- composition committee, textbook committee, assessment, GE, recruitment (department and uni) which is a little overwhelming.

Because I've been so busy I've tried to take time when I have it. I'm really glad that I got both chapters I had in the pipeline off before the semester because honestly I haven't had the energy to do any work. I did have an epiphany that with my school's tenure requirements (a book OR 3 articles), and my position (as a generalist), I have a bit of freedom. I purposely did not sign up for any conferences this year because I knew the learning curve would be steep but honestly, after the dumpster fires of just about every conference in my field, I'm happy to not. I may try to work out a local MLA to take students, and maybe a PCA in the future, but that may be it. Also, IF the two book chapters I have forthcoming don't count (the language is odd) then I feel really confident about getting 3 articles out. I'm working on one about Guthlac, another about the tv shows Evil and The Exorcist, which is really the next step from one of the book chapters I did, and I'm secure I can come up with another idea. I'd like to get all three done/submitted by May, so IF they're not accepted I have time- because remember these are not the requirements for my 3 year but tenure.

But here's the epiphany I had- I spent both dissertations and my rejected book trying to write what others wanted. *I* want to work on how folkloric figures in literature and popular culture are used as vehicles for fears, anxieties, and desires and what work these figures DO. In fact, all my published work does exactly that. And this was my epiphany- I have my PhD. I have a job. I can be any kind of scholar I want. I've struggled with certain types of writing because it's been me trying to round peg square hole. But I don't have any reason to do that any more. I can write and submit the work I want. I can write the book I want. I can publish practical stuff on teaching.

So I redesigned my teaching portfolio around this idea, which was fun. It's certainly made me excited about projects to get started on.

I am still learning my way around and how to navigate some things. I sent a survey out to find out why students weren't coming to class so I could help, and many saw it as a dig, so that was a misstep. A lot of students call me Ms. or Mom or in one case Momma which is a whole bag of gendered, complicated stuff. On one hand I think part is that teachers get called Ms. and in the South people get called Miss and first name, and first gen students maybe don't realize their professors are different from their K-12 teachers. On another, I know the title of "school mom" is one of respect, and shows that they know I support them, help them out, and am there for them.

But I can understand all this and not like it. On my part this is not a power play thing, most of my students call me Karra or Dr.K.It's a really serious gender stereotype thing. I can understand the cultural compliment and still resent the fact that my hard work, the research, the time, I put into providing this environment is erased because my behavior and actions are expected. There's also the very complicated situation of assuming a woman of 43 wants to be a mother, and/or making judgments on them if they are not. I think it's actually REALLY important for students to see a variety of mentors and professors as role models in ways that maybe challenge their expectations.

I think that a female mentor and professor who is nurturing, and cares, has the immense work it takes to do this erased by calling her mom. I think calling a professor mom (and to be clear, male professors are not called dad) assumes that they are caring and supportive because of their gender, which also works in reverse- if someone feels a female professor is not nurturing and supportive they are "cold" and "unfeeling" because they're being judged against a gender stereotype. I've had evaluations where I was judged exactly this, where students have told me I don't look, dress, or act like a professor should.

I also really resent that female academics everywhere have to do all this extra work that our male counterparts do not.

I also know that me pushing back on this has to be done calmly and in a certain way to avoid being told to "calm down" that "it's not that serious" or that I'm being hysterical and that there's a good chance I'll still be told all those things.

And yet, except for finally telling one male student no, you cannot call me "Momma" I am unsure on how to address this with the students, who are majors, and who I like. I know they mean it as a compliment. I don't want to hurt their feelings.

I am teaching a gender and lit course in the spring, and they are going to take the implicit bias test for gender the first day, so I thought about in my intro talking about MY personal experiences and see if that does it without students feelings called out.

I do feel like I expected things to all be easier because I have been teaching for almost 20 years, and I was tripped up by things as simple, and complicated, as how I'd lesson plan or take attendance. I finally found something that worked, but it took a while. I spent so long in school systems that dictated formats that not having any meant really thinking about why I did the things I did and what I wanted to do.

I have been really happy with the grade conferences and have pushed it further for next semester. This semester composition classes had 75% of their grade as low stakes assignments and class activities, so a guaranteed "C" if they came to class and did the work with their three major writing assignments and writing portfolio as 25% of their grade. This still ended up feeling like policing, students who missed class and then had to make up things. So instead, next semester I will still design class assignments that scaffold skills and help build toward the big stuff but it won't be graded. The three major assignments and writing portfolio will each be 25% and we'll still grade conference on them.
For the upper level major courses I'm taking it even further- students will keep writer's notebooks for class, and I'll model activities and things to prep and share for class. But no graded assignments. Instead, we will grade conference at midterms and finals and they will use these notebooks to show to me what progress they've made on answering essential questions for the class, and use that to argue for grades to be posted.

I think too spring should be easier because I'm just teaching my 4 classes and a History of the English Language independent study, which has turned into a small (4 students) tutorial, which I'm also very excited about. My onboarding/new person training should be over, and while I may have more service stuff, my schedule should be better, and there should not be as steep a learning curve.

There are a few things I've learned this first semester.

1. If you have unexpected time off, take it.
2. Cut yourself slack because it all IS a big learning curve.
3. Me having a precise, everything scheduled, way really helped.
4. My moves to be kind, trust students, and stop policing are the best I've ever made. Pretty much if it was anything a student thought they have to justify to me I don't do it.
5. I should really stop doing extra work.

So, I think all in all it's been a good first semester. I am looking forward to the break because being "on" all the time IS exhausting. I am really looking forward to the spring. 

Building a Bogeyman: Constructing Folklore in Real Time

I got my Master's in Science: Secondary Education from the City University of New York: College of Staten Island. The students and staff called it something else, Willowbrook University.

As someone who attended night classes after teaching all day, I can tell you that the origins of the campus are very clear in the rolling green hills and architecture of the buildings. It still very much looks like a mental institution. And it was not hard to be creeped out walking across an almost empty campus night after night.

The horror of the place, the expose, was all common knowledge to the staff and students, although I'm sure the administration preferred to ignore it.

The staff I encountered, security guards and custodians, mostly locals, were always happy to tell stories about Willowbrook. One story in particular stuck with me- that removing so much of the equipment after the scandal broke and the state school was closed was too expensive, so in many of the buildings they just stored things in the basement and padlocked the rooms.

Of course, this is all wrong- the perception, WHY I and others constructed Willowbrook as horror, what scared us. As Sarah Handley-Cousins wrote so excellently for Nursing Clio, the construction of the asylum as haunted depends on the audience viewing disabled people as scary, a threat, a horror. At Willowbrook the torturous conditions the people were subjected to was a combination of a staff that did not care about basic human conditions, unregulated state schools, and horrific misconceptions on mental health. The stories I heard during my time there reflected this. I was there in 2001-2004, and was not in New York during the original reporting, but I knew who Geraldo Rivera was, although not that this was his "big break." The stories I heard still seemed fresh in people's minds. The stories I heard were of the criminally insane that were put in locked wards at Willowbrook because they did not fit at Riker's. Stories about people who were mentally ill or disabled, whose families put them in Willowbrook when they were very young and then promptly forgot about them. People who were deaf and mute, locked in rooms with dozens of others, of varying, serious, conditions, with food thrown at them, hosed off occasionally, sitting in their own filth.

 It is often reported as the "institution that shocked a nation into changing its laws." But while that's a convenient and easy story to tell, it's not really true. When Robert Kennedy visited in 1965 he famously called the place a "snake pit." But nothing changed. In 1972 Rivera took cameras inside and showed the world the horrific conditions which resulted in court cases that changed conditions and treatment. But Willowbrook remained open until 1987. In 1993 The College of Staten Island took over the campus.

There were plenty of true horrors of Willowbrook. How the residents were treated. How their families abandoned them. How staff disregarded the human beings in their care. The misunderstanding and total uninterest in treatment of mental health and disability. Then there are the horrors that continue to be perpetrated in the name of Willowbrook. The atrocities of that place have become local folklore, which means that the very real people who suffered there have been erased from the story, serving as background to set the haunted mood. What happened to them once Willowbrook closed? In light of the state of health care today has society learned anything, done anything different, or are they just better at hiding the Willowbrooks? Or in the case of the treatment at the camps on the border is it just a matter of perspective? Drawing clear lines between who matters and who doesn't? Horror requires a normal, an audience that is the object of the lesson, and the abnormal, that is the lesson. Historically who and what has been classified as horror is classist, racist, misogynist, and reflects colonial and patriarchal norms.

Willowbrook State School and the stories  told on the College of Staten Island campus are a lesson in folklore unfolding in real time. These stories are not from 100 or 1000 years ago, they are within a human lifetime yet how easily the real people affected by these horrors have been erased, leaving behind mood and images of hauntings that are totally divorced from reality.

I was reminded of all this this past week with two separate incidents.

The first was students were telling me about a haunted building on campus. We'd been talking about other things, and somehow it came up that dorms were full, overloaded almost, even though we had a couple of buildings/dorms that were empty, abandoned. Now, our school has gone through a period of low enrollment that we're recovering from, and the campus is slowly but surely renovating buildings that have needed it for a while so these conditions are not unusual or unexpected. But for the students this is not the story told. The students say that the building has been abandoned because it is haunted because a woman, a student, was brutally murdered there. They knew her name, the details (I later looked them up, they were accurate), and the aspect that I believe has led to it becoming folklore on campus- the fact that her murder is to date unsolved, and that it was reported the murderer taunted the family saying they'd killed the wrong woman.

True crime blogs have fed the sensational aspect by describing racist "wilding" behavior as having occurred on campus earlier, not too subtly blaming this environment for the murder. Then there's the aspect of betrayal, fear, because it occurred on campus in a dorm room. Feelings of normalcy and safety were an illusion. Blogs also create a conspiracy out of the event, saying that it's suspicious there is no "digital footprint" for the case, despite it occurring a good decade before Internet use.

The story has all the elements of a horror tale. The fact that the students know the details 35 years after the fact, and with few of them with local knowledge, not being from here, speaks to how easily and quickly this story became part of the campus' story. But to accept the horror of the tale is to ignore the racist framing of "savage" and "wild" predators and gangs that threatened a southern town. It ignores the fact that women are sexually assaulted and murdered at alarming rates. It also ignores the institutional racism in the south and elsewhere that determines who gets justice, who is deemed worthy of investigation, justice, and who is not. 

The students who told me the story were Black women, and I wondered how much this played into it. Did they construct this tale as horrific because the woman killed was Black? Does this tale resonate because the murder is unsolved? Because it focuses on common fears of college women- the isolation of living away from home, away from the safety of the known, exaggerated and internalized racist ideas of dangers in majority Black cities? The fear that if something happened to them justice would not be done? Why does THIS story get repeated?

The students did misidentify the location of the murder. They claimed it happened in a building currently empty when it occurred in a currently occupied residence hall. The facts are available online with little searching, so why the misidentification? Is it convenience to place it in an empty and unrenovated building? Does a used building not fit the narrative? Is it a reflection of how they constructed the horror of the tale, a way of placing distance between themselves and the horror, that it has to be in an empty building, one not used, the inside not seen, safely contained and not in a building students are currently living in? 

The other story I heard was just a few days later. This time the tellers of the tale were faculty not students. Someone asked where I lived, and I explained I was next to the hospital, a few houses down from the nursing home that is primarily a care facility for dementia patients. I was complaining that the EMTs aren't allowed to smoke on hospital grounds, so them drive in front of my house, smoke, and leave their cigarette butts all over the place. I also told them about this one man, in a wheelchair, who rolls himself over from the nursing home, to smoke, then rolls himself back. This prompted the faculty to tell me the story.

They were shocked that security was so loose because just a couple of years ago, a woman wandered off and died due to hypothermia (it was February). The place was supposedly under new management, and it does have two sections, one that is assisted living and one that is for the patients with dementia, so it's not unreasonable to think the man is just sneaking off then returning without issue. The story they told me was that she wandered off, but INTO the forest/swamp directly behind the home, and the entire neighborhood. The land behind this entire section of town is dense trees, wisteria, sloping down to swamp and then the river. Their story told me she'd wandered off and become lost in the woods. In reality, she wandered down the street and was found in a greenhouse about half a mile away. Unlike the murder, they did not know the woman's name. She was anonymous. Like the stories surrounding Willowbrook, she was a symbol, a stand in, not a real person. They specifically identified her as a dementia patient, she was not, she was part of the assisted living section, and it was reported she'd wandered off before. There was no alarm on the front door, so no one noticed when she left. The building is not gated or secured in any way. She most likely just walked out the door and down the street.

Unlike the haunted dorm story, these changes are a little easier to understand, and as much as they're disturbing for the fact that people still construct mental illness and disease as a horror, it is a known and familiar element. News reports, like the story I was told, erase her as a person from the narrative. There is a picture of her, her name, but the focus is on the death, and the consequences the home faced for the neglect. Her obituary tells a different story. Her picture is bright, cheerful. She was a caregiver within the community, with children, and grandchildren. She suffered from Alzheimer's, and probably became disoriented once she lost sight of the home (there's a bend in the road). She is a sad victim of neglect, a single narrative in a sea of them about how we mistreat and discard our elderly.

Her story as relayed to me already has the makings of folklore. An older woman walks into the forest, dies mysteriously. I've written before about the power of the folkloric forest. The forest and swamp that lead to the river are wild, dense, full of dangers, a reminder on the edge of the subdivision that not all is ordered and able to be controlled. Perhaps shifting the story to the forest mitigates the responsibility of the people who allowed her to wander off to her death. Does constructing a siren call of a forest as undeniable make the story more tragic? More inevitable? When did the story first shift to there? Was it an assumption on the part of the audience because it runs all along the subdivision, impossible to ignore? Because it's easier than believing she wandered down a residential street, into someone's yard and greenhouse and no one noticed? Is the forest a better, more palatable bogeyman than inattentive people?

Taken together, what stories or responsibility are these folkloric narratives explaining away? While the stories on the surface appear very different, they are both about women, from groups who have historically been neglected and ignored. In both stories as relayed to me the women are silent. There was no bit about screaming or yelling in the hauntings. The murdered young woman was described only for her murder, not for her family, or that she was graduating and going to be a teacher. In constructing her story as folklore, her true narrative has been lost. The story of the wandering woman has no dialogue. Her disappearance into the forest is the totality of the story. Who she was, how she got there is erased, considered of no consequence.

Both of these stories, told to me so close together made me think about how quickly stories can be constructed as folklore. A couple of years, a couple of decades, and the reality is transformed. It got me thinking about why this happens, to whom. I also realized that for an area that is quick to tell stories of ghostly colonists and pirates, in all my years of living here I really cannot recall this kind of specific folklore. Is it because the folklore of this region focuses on groups who are marginalized, whose stories aren't shared out of certain groups? Given where we are, is the folklore divided by race? What stories have I never heard? Whose stories have been ignored? What could we gain by studying these stories? Both their construction as folklore and the truth of their beginnings, the work of telling the world about these women. Who they were, not what the stories made them out to be.

How I am Teaching Shakespeare This Semester

When I was planning out my Shakespeare class this semester I wanted to do it a little differently.
I wanted to use a few narrow lenses to focus on and teach the students to view the plays.
I wanted to focus on really unpacking and digging in on the plays we covered, not to rush to cover things.

Here is my syllabus.

The idea was to look at four plays, Macbeth, Twelfth Night, Othello, and The Tempest. For each play I would present the students with the lens to view the play through- gender roles, race, colonialism. In week one I would ask them what they thought of those lenses, what their current knowledge and preconceptions were. For week two we would read and discuss the play, first covering comprehension, then analysis. In week three we would read scholarly articles and discuss them. I tried to choose scholars that represented major arguments in the field. I tried to have good representation of Scholars of Color, queer theory, controversies. I have shown the students what these scholars look like. I was lucky enough that #RaceB4Race was this semester, and I shared that as well with them.

I framed Macbeth as the slow walking play. We watched the Patrick Stewart movie version first, then talked about gender roles. I walked them through the comprehension and analysis. I modeled what we would be doing with the other plays. Then we applied gender roles to Twelfth Night. 

I have been explicit in my conversations about race and gender roles. I am very thankful to the work of Shakespeare Scholars of Color on Twitter, and especially the SAA15 Modern Race Bibliography. I have shared these things with my students. Their English majors, and I think it's important to have these explicit, clear conversations with them and that they know the field they're going into. Also, I think it's very important they SEE that there are scholars like them out there.

There have been a few things I learned so far this semester:

• Our school does rental textbooks that is covered as part of their tuition, which is cool. BUT it also means that students cannot write in their books which is kinda a big deal for English majors. I encouraged Dover editions, and showed them Folger's Digital Editions, but at this point, decided this was ridonkulous, and I bought them copies of Othello and The Tempest because I think it's important they be able to annotate in their books.
• Many have only covered the No Fear version of Shakespeare so we've spent more time on the language and comprehension.
• I've also had them take pictures of their notes as prep for class to help them see how important that is.

They all seem to like the class, and the set up has worked. I have cut some of the secondary readings, because I rather they have the time to focus on and unpack a single article rather than rush through multiple journal articles.

There were four main assignments, a presentation/project that is a way for them to informally explore a topic they might be interested in, a close reading paper, a response to a scholarly article, and a final paper/project (an unessay). Their intro to research topics were very cool. Next week we'll start on their close reading papers, and we've been doing class activities that focus on that. We've been reading and discussing scholarly articles, so they've also had practice prepping them for the response. Their final paper/project can be any topic, any form, and we'll spend time talking those through, but I encourage them to use one of the lenses that we've studied and use that as the foundation for their project.

The Shakespeare class is currently a required class. I am suggesting that we replace it with an Early Modern Global Texts class. First, because that's the state of the field. Two, I think it is a better fit. And finally, I think the texts will be better.

While I've made adjustments, the frame of the class has worked well. I think it helps a lot to have clear lenses so they know what they're reading for especially with texts they're not familiar with. And like I said, they're enjoying the class and format.

Midterm Conferences

My school does midterm exams, Thursday through Wednesday.
I teach Composition, Brit Lit Survey I, and Shakespeare and don't give tests so I decided to do something different.
I cancelled classes and instead asked students to sign up for one on one conferences in 15 minute increments. I told them I was doing this because I understood they had classes that DID give midterms, and I wanted to give them a bit of a break, and a chance to focus on those classes.
These conferences were super low-key. In my office, I have my desk where my computer is off to the side, and a table where I conference with students. The conference table is the first thing you see when you walk in.

I bought snacks. I wanted to buy fruit- bananas, apples, grapes, but I was worried I'd end up with an office full of rotting fruit so I bought this. There were some student requests, which I fulfilled. Then, funnily enough, when I TOLD the students I wanted to get fruit, they said they would've eaten fruit, so yesterday I bought fruit for Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday's conferences.

My conferences are short and sweet.
I ask how they're feeling about the class.
I ask if there's anything they need help with.
I ask if there's anything I can do.
I ask how their midterms and other classes are going.
Before they leave I tell them good luck on their midterms, and that there are snacks if they want.

I learned a lot about my students in these two days. Some when asked about how they feel about the class answer by telling me how they feel they are doing in the class. Some answer by telling me how they feel I'm doing in the class. Some shared some very rough things. When you ask students how they are, and they know that you're asking because you genuinely care, they answer you.

There were some things that they mentioned, stood out that I thought I'd share.
Every student who comes in my office comments on how nice it smells. I always have an apple-cinnamon plug in. I learned from my years of teaching high school, that a welcoming smell can make a big difference. In fact, some students knew to find my office BECAUSE someone told you it smelled good.
My door is decorated, with notices, comics, pictures. When I was a 1st gen student, and knew nothing about college, door decorations were always interesting to me. How welcoming a professor might be. What they were liked. My students like that Nehi is on my door, both in a picture AND that my weekly schedule says that I go home at lunch to let Nehi out. They also liked my Calvin and Hobbes cartoon. They didn't know who they were, but they thought the cartoon was funny.

I also put out my game of Othello. I bought it just for my office. The tagline for the game is "a minute to learn, a lifetime to master." I used to play with my Mom, and man, she used to throw that tagline in my face! I swear, all the years we played, I think I only beat her a couple of times. I tell my students this story when they ask about the game. Several stayed to play with me. They said they liked it. I told them they were always welcome to come back and play.

I have a deck of cards too. I like playing gin rummy, but no one took  me up on it.

I did not have a lot of goals with doing this other than showing students I understood what was going on with them, giving them space to breathe, and offering support. I think these types of things are important.

One of the things I really love about where I am is that I am building something here. I see these types of things as laying a foundation. This midterm routine will become a regular thing. Students will learn they can depend on it. I hope it opens the door to them feeling more comfortable to come see me, use me as a resource, and for our English majors, an advisor.

These are small kindnesses. They don't cost much. But the impact, the effect, I hope, is big.