Breakfast on the Orient

"Chinese, Japanese, dirty knees, look at these!" girls used to sing in loud chorus on the playground.  I wonder if they still do. The thought makes me shudder. This and countless other jokes, gestures and rhymes filled my childhood, as they may have yours.  It's strange to think that some of the most horrendous or offensive things we may ever say we utter long before we know better.  I sang this song, and I had classmates of Asian descent that I considered friends.  I never imagined that I was being party to racism.  If I had, I would have been mortified.  The very thought of all my cultural faux pas' of my youth make me cringe, but they have no lingering evidence, aside from my memories and those who remembered my words.  This makes me wonder about artists, whose work reflects the implicit racism of their time, long after times have changed.  For instance, I've always admired Audrey Hepburn, and loved "Breakfast at Tiffany's", until I tried to watch it recently.  I couldn't take it.  I was shocked, as if I was seeing for the first time the racist attempts at humor.  Did people really ever think that was okay?  They must have.  Heck, I must have, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to stomach the movie, let alone love it.  And that was in the 90's.  The 1990's.  Shame on me.  Shame on us.

The Essentials

Flour, sugar, rice. That's what they needed, so that's what they bought. Every time. No matter how much Michael pleaded or begged. He's lucky I'm getting the sugar. Last month,  he begged so hard for basil seeds that Steven threw them in for free.  That was infuriating.  How dare he presume to parent for me, to run my farm? No matter,  he can grow it, but I won't eat it. The boy has more food than he knows what to do with.  It's bad enough that Pat will be home next month,  buying whatever he wants,  playing the hero, turning our world upside down.  It's best he stay away and leave us to it. We'd be better off without him. The boy needs to learn the difference between needs and wants.  He needs to learn the value of a dollar.  He still owes me for the broken lamp. He owes me.
"Is this all for today?" Steven asked as he rang up the items. The question was directed at the boy, who was twirling the seed rack with great interest.
She followed the grocer's gaze, tightened her lips and replied, "Yes, Steven, it's all we need."

The Protagonist

"Write my life," the Protagonist said.
The writer took a long drag on the cigarette. There were no less than fifteen stories already in the works when they met. A week later and the Protagonist had filled the writer's mind with enough narratives to fill a library. 
The writer tugged on the horse blanket and thought.
Where to begin?
If only the writer didn't love the Protagonist so much. How to honor someone with such unimaginable memories?  And when to write?  Their conversation runs hours into days.
Five minutes after the request was made,  and the writer had heard two more stories and was being handed a plate of grilled snook and vegetables.
"...I dragged my mom into the police station and begged them to do something a year before the murder," the Protagonist said as he swirled his glass of Pinot Noir.
The writer,  now carrying the weight of the mantle placed on her shoulders tried to think like a writer.

Prodigal Son

She turned away from the cold, and caught a glimpse in the shadows.
"What's wrong? "
She did all She could do. She pointed to the swingset. The swingset. 
Pat looked, and dropped Sasha's leash. There he was. TJ.  In the same clothes he was last seen wearing,  7 years ago.  The striped tank top pulled awkwardly across his broad chest.

Picture

Please bear with me as I continue to excavate my anger. Each level of acceptance and forgiveness unearths a new level of pain, and with it, more opportunity for healing. 

For the past week or so, I have been noticing old pictures of me in my memories on Facebook.  As they pop up,  I am struck with two thoughts. First, the memory of the photograph, which is always how self-conscious I felt in that moment.  How ugly, fat, and awkward I felt.

Then, my eyes see the picture. I was, in all of those pictures,  beautiful.  Far more than I ever saw or felt. Not hot, or supermodel perfect,  but certainly worthy of being comfortable in my own skin. Which I wasn't. 

Damn him, for squandering my youth and beauty.  Damn me, too.

This is a valuable,  painful,  and all too common lesson. 

I hope I don't forget.  I hope I never again  let someone else get in the way of me seeing myself. There simply isn't any room for anyone else in the mirror.

Dirty Little Secrets

Netflix just released the new season of Orange is the New Black,  and my Facebook feed has been filled with it. That and spoilers of Game of Thrones, and The Walking Dead. All shows I watched in another life. In this one, though, my TV addiction is Pretty Little Liars.  I binge watched the first five seasons this winter and missed the addition of season six until today. Five episodes in, and I finally realized the draw for me with this show. 

If you haven't seen it,  it centers around a group of teenaged girls who live in a state of constant terror and silence at the hands of an unseen enemy.  They are living in a state of fear and paranoia where whenever they relax, another threat arises. The emotions they are dealing with are all too familiar for me.

I can relate to their need to put on a false smile and pretend everything is okay, in order to save their loved ones.  They are suffering from PTSD while they remain in a war zone. This is the dramatization of what it's like to live in an emotionally abusive relationship. 

They have been beaten down and fight to remind themselves that they are worthy of love,  life, and peace.  It is by rooting for them  that I am learning to root for myself. 

I sometimes fear that I was too fragile, too battle weary to enter the new relationship that I am in. That may be true,  but it is also true that I am deserving of the love,  laughter, and peace that my current relationship provides.

Maybe it's possible to heal while moving forward.  Short of institutionalization,  we don't get to press pause and heal. Most of us bandage our wounds while we are still on the field. Life has no timeouts.

Radioactive

Sera stretches her legs as the alarm sounds.  She has no idea how long she's been out.  She waits for the bed to release its hold on her.  She finally rolls over and heads straight to the shower.  She waits in line, of course.  The entire dorm just came to.  Like the other drones ahead of her, she hangs her towel, stretches her arms wide, and waits for the spray.  Warm liquid sprays the gray stone.  She turns, to make sure not to miss a spot.  She steps into the towel waiting for her, and follows her tribe down the dormer hall for her check-up.

"We have to make sure you're in fighting shape," chuckles the doctor.  The oldest human on the ship, she makes jokes out of everything.  "Today's the big day.  Let's get you into make up," she giggles as she leads Sera to the war room.  The room is meant to evoke any primative ghosts in the machines, Doc explains.  This is what you've been made for.  Dozens of worlds depend on your ability to defend this side of the galaxy.  Prentice takes her time, shading in reds, coppers, blacks, into images of serpents, bears, tigers, hawks, and other creatures of legend onto her limbs, her torso.

Sera has heard that ancient humans once had a similar procedure, back when humans were flesh and bone.  The repetitive whir of the machine is torture enough on her titanium core.  How brave her ancestors were.

Pressure Points

I spent the better part of the afternoon getting knots worked out of my pressure points, thanks to my sweetheart. As I felt him work his way from my Achilles tendon to a calf muscle that has been giving me trouble for years, tears welled up in my eyes.

I have suffered in silence for years. I couldn't make my pain invisible enough. There is only so much yoga, foam rollers, and tennis balls can do; people need to be touched.

Outwardly, my ex and I were very affectionate. We held hands often, and I rarely entered a room full of people without his hand on my back. But we never kissed. I shouldn't say never. We sometimes kissed during sex. But he wouldn't touch my feet. Ever. No matter how badly they hurt. Asking him to scratch my back evoked a look as though I'd asked him to build me the great wall of China.

By the last year of our marriage, holding hands began with him cracking my thumb. It was painful, and I begged him to stop. But it was the price for touch.

We slept for eight years on a broken bed that hurt my back. Four years into it, I had neck surgery-- it was that bad. He finally broke down and bought a new bed, and six months later had another woman in it.  Man that hurt. Why couldn't he do her on the couch, so I could have taken the wonderful bed I'd longed for so long for in the divorce?

Fast forward to now. I can't lotion my feet without my dear man rubbing my poor soles. That's what he does, what I'm most grateful for. He rubs my soul. He frees my pain.

For so many years, I'd suffered in silence. Hid my pain. Feared sympathy. The only person I told my pain to responded with irritation. He complained for months if I let on that I hurt to anyone. Seriously, that was an actual fight he threw in my face. I'd not hidden the pain from a pulled groin well enough on a double date. He claimed i was seeking attention. I really just wanted to be home. This was his shining example of the depths of my manipulation.

So I built walls. I put on a fake smile and showed the world what a happy wife looked like.

He used to say a lot that another man might buy me flowers or kiss me, but only he loved me enough to take care of me.

Another jewel of his: No one's ever been nicer to you than me. My silent response always was: Isn't that sad.

Letting Go of the Past

In the words of Sting, " I keep the faith in my fashion. ". This Rosh Hashanah, I contemplated the past year. I've been carrying a lot of guilt and shame about getting divorced, and how it's impacting my youngest son. I woke up today, having coffee on the river, thinking of the stones I should throw to atone for my failings. Being raised Catholic, guilt is an easy garment for me to wear. I'm happy to share, instead, where my day ended up.

Tonight, on a bike ride home from downtown, in the rain, I found myself rejoicing. I find rain sacred, and today, it brought sweet revelations.

I was wearing the pants I bought last summer for spin class at the gym when I was getting in shape for the Tough Mudder last fall, where I realized that I had no more desire to impress my ex and he had lost all compassion for me. I was riding the bike our oldest son left behind when he joined the army, a bike my ex hated, but I refused to give up last spring, when I knew the end was near, but before I knew about my ex's affair. My bike was decked out with a new bell, lights, and a basket (basket!) that my new love surprised me with.

I used to love bike riding as a child. Five years ago, my ex and I bought the first bike I've owned since I was in middle school, when my mom's boyfriend turned my bike into a guitar. About a year later, my ex upgraded to a $700 mountain bike, but wouldn't fix my flat. My bike lay unused for years as a result, much like our oldest son's did, for the same reason.

Riding my son's bike, tricked out by my new love, in the rain, jumping puddles, this Rosh Hashanah filled me with the joy in knowing that everything is as it should be. To regret anything of the past year, would be to rue today, which I cannot do. Today is the culmination of all my yesterday's, and I wouldn't trade it for the world.

Turn and Face the Strain

I used to be so calm, so settled, so forgiving.

I am a flagellant; I must forgive, because I am so guilty. Blame my Catholic roots, my Jewish stepmother, my fractured heart, but understand this: I must forgive.

Hate, anger, and resentment hold me bound. They damage my wings. They make my soul bleed. They are usually unnecessary in creating anything good out of a day.

Yet, here I am. Angry, hurt, scorned.

I am ashamed of this. It goes against my nature. I'm a roll with the punches kind of girl. A natural cheek turner. I pride myself on humility.

But I've been wronged. I've been cheated, and, insult to injury, I protect my attacker like a true victim.

I find it impossible to be honest about these feelings in real life. I can't tell the truth of my pain. Doing so injures me so much more than any wound I've suffered. But I'll tell you the truth. Here. Shhhh. Pretend I never said this, or I'll never trust you again.

I am furious at being betrayed by my closest friend. I struggle to forgive and I don't know why. The whole world knows I've been wronged; I don't need validation in my role as victim.

That's what it is. I resent pity, being made victim. I hate it. It feels like the hardest slap to my ego.

The sooner I really feel this, the sooner I can let it go. I hope.

I had to read Scripture at my dad's wedding this weekend. The passage was about forgiveness. Every word was true. I barely got through it. I cried helplessly when I was done.

I used to be a master at forgiveness. But all my other tests pale in comparison to this one. This betrayal may be the one to break me, may just be bad enough to turn me into something I hate, into someone I can't respect. God help you if it does. I'll never forgive you of that.

Ch-ch-changes Invite to Write prompt #2

Live the Life you Love

By Dana LaLonde

I am in the midst of changing my life in ways I'd only dreamed of. I have had a dream version of myself my whole life. I imagine many of us do.

I've always wanted to be a citizen of the world, stranger to none, lover of my fellow man. I have always wanted to go somewhere unfamiliar and call it home. I've always wanted to immerse myself in a life full of communal joy. I have visions of a house in the woods, jazz streaming through the yard, friends new and old passing through, celebrating the sweet joys that only creating community can bring.

I want to make the world my home and strangers my family.

I want to live in a tiny house in the Andes.

I want to take away all the comforts I cling to see what I really need.

I want to live in harmony with nature and an ancient culture.

I want to create a sustainable life on a small farm, minimizing my ecological footprint.

I need this. I need to be someone I am proud of.

In the end, we live the life we must.

We make the choices we can live with.

My whole life I've devoted to creating a normal, American suburban life. I did. I am a soccer mom, a teacher in my hometown, the proud mom of an American soldier. The problem is, I'm not normal; I'm a writer.

I've realized recently that my need to create new worlds on paper stems from my need to create a new world for myself. My life didn't suit me.

Thanks to various changes this year, another woman has moved seamlessly into my old life, giving me the opportunity to create a new one. I am thankful for this chance, for the opportunity to be unabashedly myself.

I have the opportunity to be the woman I admire. I have the opportunity to show my sons another way of being. I have the opportunity to create myself, on my terms, in my way. I have the opportunity to chase my dreams, giving my decade of former students an object lesson of living.

I can't wait to see who I become.

Dear Maya

I too know why the caged bird sings.

She sings for peace,
For freedom.
In anger
At being caged in the first place.
In pain from beating her
Wings against the bars
That hold her in, she sings
In defiance of
The indignities she's suffered.

She sings, enraged.
She sings because the truth
Flies from her mouth, unbidden.

She cries,
Seeking solace, seeking refuge.
Desperate to retain that final
Shred of dignity.
She sings
For her homeland,
Out of pride
For who she would have been, uncaged.

She sings
In longing, lamenting that the cage
Exists at all.
She mourns
Her own soul,
Knowing the cage is her own
Design, fashioned to keep
The world out, soldered by
Fear of freedom. Imprisoned
By her younger self.

Maya, I know this wasn't your
Answer, but it's your fault.

Thank you.

Silent All These Years

I am a rape victim.

It took me 23 years to be able to say this sentence.

To be able to call myself victim.  To be able to call how I lost my virginity.  To recognize that my abuser took more than my innocence, stole more than my girlhood.  He continues to brutalize me.  I continue to blame myself.  I could kill him with my bare hands for what he did to my sons' mother.  My boys deserved to be raised by a woman who felt whole.  They deserved a mom who didn't see a killer in every shadow, threat behind every smile.

I have to forgive him.  Not yet.  I just left denial.  I need to feel rage for a little bit.  I need to feel anger towards someone other than myself.  I need to cleanse myself in my ire, to learn to protect myself, to save myself, to value myself, to love myself.

I've been hurting for 23 years and I thought I deserved it.

I can take a couple weeks of sheer rage, knowing that I didn't.

Fifty Shades of Grey movie review

On the way home from seeing Fifty Shades for GNO, or more specifically, mom's night out, we started asking ourselves, why?
Why do we like this story? And not just us, why do so many women feel drawn to Ana and Christian's love story? Why, like Twilight before it, are forty-ish women flocking to this story like a siren call? Could it be that we are sex-starved and desperate? Nope. Not our group. Sex-crazed perverts? Closer, but no. That doesn't feel right either. Uninformed about violence against women and unwittingly glorifying abusive relationships, as Twitter will undoubtedly claim?
No. That's not it. I follow Femen and support Pussy Riot's cause. I am notorious for posting what my friend's husband calls "bra burning" messages on Facebook. While I am not raising a  daughter, the rest of my friends are. And they do so conscientiously.
So what made us leave our families to trek to the theater en masse to see a bondage flick?
That's the million dollar question.
The answer is, I'm not sure there is an answer. Not just one, anyway. Maybe there are fifty reasons why.
One reason is curiosity. Some women, and some men, might be curious about the lifestyle, or nontraditional sexual relationships in general. Maybe, like Ana, we are curious as to why someone would choose to be a Dominant, or a Submissive.
Maybe. Or maybe it's not so much about the unfamiliar. Maybe it's about how rampant violence against women is. And that women aged between twenty and twenty-four years old are at the greatest risk of becoming victims. Maybe it has to do with our knowledge that romantic relationships are a dangerous place for women. That domestic violence is the most common cause of injury to women between the ages of eighteen and forty-four.
The CDC reports that twenty percent of women will be victims of sexual violence by a lover, and thirty-six percent report being a victims of sexual assault, rape, or stalking. This means all of us know someone who has been victimized.
Recently, there has been an influx of female leads in dystopic fiction. It is becoming commonplace to see a woman running for her life through the woods onscreen,  not as the victim of a killer, but as a victim of society. This seems relevant here. While on one hand we are taking our children to see women take on the world, we are taking ourselves to see a young woman be willingly brutalized. For love, no less. Talk about your mixed messages. We would have to be blind to not see the issues many groups are taking with this film.
That said, I don't think this film is speaking to the domestic violence that is undeniable, but more the gray areas. The sixty-four percent of women, not the victims of attack, but subject to horror stories and media images, leaving them wondering just how safe they are.
Our fascination with Mr. Grey is that he gives us things life doesn't. Like safe words. We have no such thing in real life.  Ana intentionally ires Christian. This is not the behavior of a woman in fear. She stands her ground and says how she feels.  She has no fear that he will hurt her out of anger.
How many of us can say the same, unequivocally? Without reservation? Knowing the statistics?
We watch Ana get tied up and struck, yet she is in no real danger. She can leave anytime.
This is not to say they have a healthy relationship; he follows her on vacation.  While our current selves are thinking, red flag, our younger selves are remembering the times we sacrificed pieces of our privacy, our dreams, our independence, for love. Our age has made us wiser, more cautious, but we remember too clearly the overwhelming need to please our lover, to do whatever he asks, to be whatever he wants, and that feeling is fifty shades of f***ed up, as Christian says.
In How to Read Literature like a Professor, Foster claims that anything in literature can be about sex except sex; sex is always about power. Mr. Grey is asking permission to have power in their relationship, but he is at her mercy. Too many women feel powerless in their relationships. While many abused women stay in their relationship at their peril to help their love through his or her illness, Ana leaves when she feels her happiness is compromised. Despite her love and compassion for Grey, she feels no obligation to him.
This movie is pure fantasy. We wish we could surrender control and still feel perfectly safe.

Tell Him About It

I received a phone call recently.  A friend.  "Can you come get me?"
"Sure. Where are you?"
"Home. I don't feel comfortable."
We had just been out with her and her husband.  They are going through a rough spot, which happens, and had just been dancing together, looking happy together, which also happens.  I have no doubt that he would never hurt or, or of his love for her.  Nevertheless, I picked her up right away.

The next morning, my husband, too tired the night before to realize what happened when we got home, asked about it.  I told him: They started arguing in the car, and when they got home, she felt afraid and called me to pick her up down the road.  I said, "You don't understand what it's like to be a foot smaller than someone who is inebriated and yelling in a booming voice.  Even when you are sure you're safe with someone, it's scary."
He got quiet, and asked in a small, scared voice, "Have I ever made you feel like that?"
"Of course.  Dozens of times."
"But you know I'd never hurt you."
"I know.  But in that moment...it's scary."
That was the end of the conversation. He was quietly more affectionate and gentle than usual that day.  Pensive, seeking forgiveness for something he didn't even know that he'd done.

She and I can't be alone. Couples argue.  We fight.  We choose hard words in the dead of night, after a few drinks.  It happens.  But so does this fear.  Even when we feel safe in a relationship.  Even in a happy marriage.

My Siblings

I miss them terribly.  Most of them are dead, or dying in a nursing home.  They are not my blood relatives, and I am not speaking now of those people who called my parents mom and dad. I miss them too, and love seeing them when I can, but they are not the people with whom I shared my childhood.  They weren't my playmates; they were too "old", too "mature". No,  I am speaking of those people I always referred to as "the residents".  Although when it comes down to it, they are my brothers and sisters.

The "residents" were the adults who lived in the group home which was also my childhood home.  My mother owned such homes from before I was born until she died. I spent my first fourteen years living in an adult congregate living facility.  The residents were adults who could not quite live on their own and who required more care than their families could provide.  Many had aging parents, some were aging parents.

  I came home from school and talked about my day with Jane, who sometimes forgot she wasn't a warden any longer in a women's prison and who, once, mistaking me for an inmate out of area, struck me with her cane. She taught me how elusive both memory and truth are, which has given me patience and understanding.

 I played checkers (both types) with Leroy, whose developmental disabilities left him mentally closer to my age of 8, which I thought was a great excuse to demand the right to smoke cigars like him, after all, we were the same age! I awed at how gracefully he took being beaten at a board game by a child.  Day in and day out.  He never wanted me to take it easy on him, so I was ruthless.  He just laughed and had just as much fun as I had, which taught me how it's the journey that matters.  He taught me all the important ways of being smart.

Bobby swung by as I was doing my homework in our living space each night just to say hi.  Just to share a smile.  Bobby sustained severe head trauma after a motorcycle accident at the age of 18.  I learned so much from him.  Not moving too fast to share a smile or say hi being chief among them.

My baby sitter was Judy.  She loved my mom.  They all did.  And mom loved them right back, but Judy was special.  She suffered from both manic depression and schizophrenia.  Most days she was great, indulgent to me (which I loved, of course), really interested in what I had to say, fiercely loyal to my mother, a hard -worker (she cleaned and did odd jobs for extra cash).  A couple times a year, though, she'd go for a drive with my mom.  Oh, I'd scream and pout that I couldn't go.  They left after dinner or near bedtime and I always hated missing an adventure.  It was years before I discovered the cause of those trips.  Mom was driving her to an institution a couple hours away.  Of course I never knew this because they were usually back by morning.  Mom almost always talked her down.  She was good at talking people down. What struck me the most about Judy, and what drives so much of my heart, was more her backstory, so to speak. 

Like Bobby, her life changed at 18.  For her though, it was emotional change rather than physical.  Judy had been prom queen, beautiful, smart, really going places.  That is, until her sweetheart left her at the altar.  She spiraled downward and latent alcoholism reared its ugly head.  By the time I knew her, she looked nothing like the girl with long flowing blond hair in the faded photograph she showed me. 

Her blond hair severe, cut bluntly, died bright beige, almost yellow, with dark roots.  Her fingers stained from cigars, nails bitten to the quick. She taught me how fleeting youth and beauty are.  I blame her for not letting me relate to the 'it' girls in school.  Their concerns didn't mean anything to me.  I found them trite and boring. 

What's the point of caring about looks or popularity when we are all just one bad break-up, one tragic ride away from living a life unrecognizable to Bobby and Judy in their youth.  Bobby and Judy taught me the trick of time; how quickly reality changes; how severely our lives can change; how easy it is to not recognize yourself in the mirror.

Then there was Jeannie.  Like Leroy, closer to my eight than her forty-eight, but she was all girl.  We sat in her room for hours making collages.  Just cutting out pictures we liked.  Jeannie taught me this truth; life is one great big art project, and we are the end result.

I could go on.  There were twenty two such teachers, friends, confidants, gurus, in my childhood home.  There was the woman who never left the house without her pearls and frequently had tea with the queen.  Although, she snuck out in broad daylight on foot, in nothing but those pearls (and sometimes sneakers) quite regularly.  She taught me how persistent the mind is, how much it overrides the body, how we all live in our minds, exactly where we want to be.

 There was Ron, who suffered severe epilepsy and had a whole host of other conditions.  He'd stop by for a hi too.  He didn't drool as much as Bobby, whose mouth had all the control of a Walking Dead walker, but he had a roving eye (just one) and a nervous tic.  Those guys taught me how to look past people's actions and just see who they are.

When I think about who really knew the child I was, who fostered her, who taught her right from wrong and just damn near everything I know about life, I just can't keep them to myself.  If I have a compassionate, understanding, kind, tolerant bone in my body, it is due to them.

I've been to some great trainings for teaching students with special needs, and specifically, for creating more inclusion in the school.  Most people think it would benefit the students with special needs to spend more time with the rest of the students.  I am lucky enough to know it's the other way around.

I find it ironic that the best parts of me, the parts of my worldview that others respect, have been gained by people so frequently marginalized in society, in schools.  So much money and time is spent in trying to encapsulate the kind of emotional education that I received.  So much credence is now given to those "soft skills" and researching how to best help our children acquire them.

Zora Neale Hurston said, "There are years that ask questions and years that answer."  In so many ways I feel like I had the answers long before I knew the questions.  I feel lucky to be in a place where I see them both so clearly, and sometimes I wonder if my students know who is really teaching them.

Life in an IB School

I feel very blessed today.  I am feeling physically ill and am scheduled for a much needed dental procedure in the morning, but I feel fine otherwise.  Life, for me, is good.  Mostly because of what I get to do all day.

Currently, I am watching the rain while 11 and 12-year-olds are running Yoga Club for me.  They are walking each other through our poses to the sounds of relaxing music.  One of my Drama students just asked to play a quick round of Improv.  I teach at an IB school.

Today, my 6th graders read two poems as master texts and wrote poems in the same styles for the poetry books they are creating.  They took books from my bookcases and searched for two minutes for literary techniques and wrote the examples on the board as a mini-review.  Then they taught me the poem I assigned for reading over Spring Break. I teach at an IB school.

My Drama students planned the filming schedule for their independent film projects demonstrating their perspective of aesthetics, got to know everyone in the class a bit better by finding a compare/contrast detail for each student, and in small groups categorized words that exemplify characteristics of ideal learners, presenting their results to the class and providing their rationale.  I teach at an IB school.

Every day I watch these young people become more tolerant, self-assured, resourceful, and gracious.
Every day I leave work feeling satisfied and relaxed, almost as though I hadn't been working at all.

Yet I have.  I have to satisfy not only district and state requirements, but those of myself and the IB world school community. I am sitting at my desk right now as a volunteer. My work is never done, and I am constantly adding more things to my to-do list.  Nonetheless, I am lucky enough to do what I feel like I was born to do: create a more peaceful world through literature. I teach at an IB school. Yep, life is pretty darn good.

44

    The exit was dark, but so had been the last fifty miles of highway. She could wait no longer. She had considered peeing in a cup, but her coffee was still pretty full. She followed the signs to the gas station and pulled in near the pumps facing the road in anticipation of making a clean getaway.
    She pulled open the grimy door and took in what she could of the small store. The daughter of a Marine, she was accustomed to taking in her surroundings quickly. She did so now: one bored clerk sitting on a stool behind the glass who didn't even look up at her,three rows of sundries and auto trader magazines, yellowed from neglect,and one coffee station free of discarded wrappers or empty sweetener packets.
     Against all instincts, she walked past the coffee station, around the greeting card carousel, to the counter. "Your restroom, please?", she asked the balding attendant. greasy comb over clinging for dear life atop his glistening globe. He inhaled deeply before passing a brass key, blackened with age,  attached to a peeling blue enamel stick under the glass and pointing straight ahead,to the west side of the building. With a huff, she ran outside and to the right, past her car and around to the side of the building. She peered into the woods, seriously debating just squatting inside the treeline, stop being a wuss, it's just a bathroom at a remote exit.I bet thousands of people have stopped here over the years and survived.
     She opened the door and headed down what could only be described as a hallway,  lit only by one dim blue flashing security light. Everything in her told her to turn and run, but she followed the path ahead of her instead. How symbolic of life, she thought. How many times did she just follow the crowd, date who her friends liked, take the job a friend or family member recommended? Her thoughts trailed of right as the hallway ended.
     "What the hell?" She yelled. The concrete box that closed around her silenced her cries.
###
"Did you hear that? I think 44's here!" said one.
 "Hooray!" The others called.
###
     She blinked in the utter darkness, suddenly regretful that she didn't better appreciate the blinking blue light. Suddenly regretful that she didn't appreciate a lot of things. Like open air. And not being held captive by some sadistic fuck.
     She opened her mouth to scream but she'd seen enough TVto know she's better off saving her breath. She grew up on Oprah. The first few minutes are most critical. Assess your surroundings and your resources. No light. Limited oxygen. Concrete walls. Her purse. No, not her purse, just her wristlet. And a bathroom key. Attached to a stick. A rather large stick, she said to herself, allowing one slow smile to creep up her cheeks. It was the first smile in what could have been years.
###
     "We've got to work faster than last time,"said One. She could've been the one that spoke earlier, but she couldn't remember. None of them could. They didn't know how long they'd been here or how to be themselves. They would get memories, sometimes, strong, powerful, urgent, but belonging to someone else. The details, for them, had gotten hazy. All but one. What they would do when 44 arrived.
###
     Of course, she doesn't think of herself as 44, she's Laura, with a miscarriage, or three, an ex-husband, and a degree from Smith, and closer to 44, than she'd like. So close, she would've slapped them if she knew that's what they called her. Luckily, she didn't. They might not have spoken to her if she had.

     She heard a whisper that sounded like a greeting. If that piece of shit thinks that I'll give him the gratification of hearing me beg for my life, he's got another thing coming. He clearly gets off on torturing people, he ain't using me to help jack his sick ass off. Then she heard it louder, this time, hollow. Hollow. Then two thoughts. Am I hearing things or thinking them, and what the fuck does hollow mean? Hollow hope, hollow faith?
###
    "No. Hollow wall." All forty three voices collapsed as one and sat again in nothingness for a long time. None had the energy to voice what they all lacked the stamina to think, I hope she got the message now.
     They spend a lot of the time in solitude, which is weird considering their seemingly immutable unified state. This is what makes the memories so foggy. Maria wants to see her baby again, but who's Maria? Sonya wants to visit her childhood home, but doesn't remember the address. The one pervasive thought they all share is saving 44, who will release them all.
     By the time 44 had arrived, they had learned that they could affect their environment. They had tried to save 43, called out to her, tried to help her make her escape, not as good Samaritans, but as comrades. Their fate was entwined with hers. Save her, and their souls would be free. Perhaps still bound, but at least able to leave their place of death.
     The gas station restroom had become cold. A dead spot no one can be released from. Too much death had occurred there. The dead remained stuck, as if by inertia. Cold places are not entirely unknown to the living, and some places remain cold long after the dead have been released. Aubrey, number 17, developed the theory of cold places while she was awaiting death in her stall. She had visited Dacchau in high school, and remained stricken by the cold in that place for the rest of her 23 years, and ever since. As each victim's concrete cell dropped, this place has gotten decidedly colder.
    It was Aubrey, too, who had suggested that they were connected, bound by their common death, and would remain so until someone escaped their fate. John, number 30, for not all men use the treeline, and some who had met their own end, but alas that is another tale, John, inspired by the movie Ghost, suggested they train collectively, linking up their energies to persuade the concrete world. Persuade is the word they used, for they couldn't affect the world any longer, not really, at least.
  Thus, sending the message "Hollow wall" was the culmination of two decades of conjoined focus.
###
     Hollow wall got Laura thinking. She reassessed her resources. She had paid little attention when her house was being built. That was Jeff's realm, but she had paid rapt attention in physics class. Prof. Lawler commanded the attention of most of his female students. She tried to recall words like joists and rebar from the conserved corners of her vocabulary while digging through her small bag. Key fob, useless except to hit the alarm, to what end? Announce her captivity to her captor? No thanks. Phone, probably no service. Could she Candy Crush her way out? Doubtful. Did she ever download that flashlight? Yes. Light. Check. Okay, let's see, four walls and a ceiling. Hollow though. Any cracks? No. Corners are probably reinforced. Too bad she doesn't have a magnet. Wait. Is there? Yes! That useless compact with the broken powder. Magnetized on the bottom. That's why it was so expensive. Okay, concrete coffin, let's find your weak spot.
###
    It was torture for him to wait out the first hour and forty-five minutes. Laura was wrong, he didn't do it for that initial panic, but for those last few minutes of clinging to that final breath. They hit the walls, but no one comes close to breaking through. About 4 years ago, he hit a lull, even toyed with the idea of suicide. He'd created a game that didn't seem to have a finish line. Like when you change the monopoly rules to so the game will last an entire snowstorm. That was why he added the chisel inside the bathroom stick, to breathe life into his game. He knew it could hardly be called that. It was a game in the sense monopoly is a game when you are playing the cousins you are babysitting, and you're the banker. He had to make rules for himself, he couldn't trust the Squatters to make it interesting, now could he?
    Years ago, he'd mastered the art of lowering the Squatters' defenses. Avoiding eye contact is a great way of disarming their survivalist instincts. They presumed him bored. Tonight he risked a deep breath, but she'd interpreted it as bored disgust, rather than delight. Killing 43 (44!) people in the same way, without laying so much as a finger on them could be regarded as boring or weak to some, lucky for him he had little regard for the opinions of others, even those who share his proclivities.
     Tonight, he set his timer and resisted pleasuring himself for 45 minutes, after which, he made himself a drink, walking the length of "the room" from inside the store. Not counting tonight's grab, he figures he has room for 16 more. He wonders what he'll do when he finishes his game, start a new one, blow himself up with the evidence? He tries to relax, enjoy the moment, now is not the time for this existential bullshit.
     There is a woman breathing her last breaths on the other side of this wall and he is the only one to witness it. That is an incredibly intimate event. One that screams for the proper attire. He has had the idea more than once to keep a tuxedo in the storage room, but didn't like the potential messiness of questions. He plays "What's the Worst that Could Happen?" Almost continuously. The tuxedo scene works like this: a cop comes in for a soda while he's putting money in the safe. Copper sees the suit and asks if he's got big plans. Well the only cops come out here are highway patrol cause there ain't a town to speak of, this exit. Any line he gives, though, the cop's gonna see through. At one point he came up with monthly stories, April funeral, May graduation, June wedding, July reunion, but things got a little hazy after that. Doesn't seem worth the trouble. So, no monkey suit. This makes every little detail of his ritual, every step, crucial. This is his Midnight Mass. This is his prom.
###
     "Let's get it together, people," said one.
     "Ball, right?" Said another.
     "Yes, Ball," Said a third.
     "Just like we practiced," Said a handful.
     "Well, we practiced other stuff too,"said that one.
     "For when we get out. For after Ball," Said several.
     "Okay, sheesh, I just wanted to double check," She said.
     "Ready?" Asked most.
     "Ye-esss," replied the rest.
     "On my count," said Aubrey, who'd been watching as Laura found the spot she was ready to strike.
     "Why you?" Someone asked.
     "Shut up," said everybody else.
     "One." They gathered close together, so tight someone chuckled, remembering the question, how many angels can fit on the head of a needle, turning it into how many ghosts can curl up like a baseball to break out of their early graves and exact revenge on the serial killer who took away their matter. The one next to her, Sage (at least she thinks that's her own name), thought you don't have to have matter to make a difference.
###
    Laura raised the stick like a bat and shifted her weight to her hind leg, one, two, Three! Rang a chorus in her head. The stick bounced hard, banging into her arm, snapping back her wrist. Hard.  It hurt, bad. And it was loud. She almost gave up. She almost didn't turn her phone to the wall again to see the result of her little batting session. She almost didn't waste her time.
    Almost. Incredibly, there was a long crack on the wall. Well, a lot more than her strike would have done alone. Two inches, maybe. Big enough to notice, big enough to motivate her. She wound up again. The other 43 were with her all the way. She was so  excited, she imagined she was in Yankee Stadium. "Here's the wind up. Here's the pitch. She swung again, and the crowd went wild, after the Ball, of course.
     Progress yes, but not enough. After a dozen more swings, Laura was losing steam, and air. She slid down the wall and curled into a ball and had a good, long, cry.
    Chisel, came the whisper, unmistakable. Clear as a bell, this time. A chorus of whispers, in fact.
     "Seriously, what is going on? Who are you?"
     Later. Chisel stick.
     "Chisel stick?" She asked, but despite her confusion she felt around the stick until she found what felt like a the toothpick slot in a Swiss army knife, but on a larger scale. She pulled and smelled the unmistakably iron odor of a chisel.
     "Now this changes things," she said, a bit shocked. They all agreed.She hit the wall again and again, using the chisel to stab at it, worked through one side of a cinder block, only to get discouraged by the other. Inside of an hour, with a little help from her friends, she scurried through rubble and stood up on the other side. Took a deep breath of freedom, laced with cheap whiskey.
    Shit.
    She didn't need light to see the face of her assailant. She saw him clear as day in her mind's eye. Saw his face and where it was. She felt time stop, and knew her swing would be true. She gouged his eye with the chisel, somehow pushing through and past him as she took off for her car. Everything was shaking. Her toes, her vision, even the ground.
    She realized she left the chisel in that creep' s face as she fumbled with her key fob. She started to panic that he'd followed her out, but the sound of screams behind her helped to calm her down enough to get in and start the car. She was back on the highway before she realized she'd never peed.
  ###
    The 43, as they prefer to be called, shot through the hole, creating a bright blue ball of energy. Laura didn't notice it behind her, so focused was she on jamming the chisel into the creep' s face and getting the hell out of there. Not to worry, they'd been waiting a long time to have her back. They wasted no time, raining down flashes of heat in the form of fists of fury. It was they that knocked him down and beat him mercilessly as Laura made her escape. She and everyone else would attribute his bloody condition to adrenaline. Her therapist spent a lot of those first hours in convincing her that she'd repressed the memories of beating the creep to death.  Eventually, she would chalk the voices in her head up to auditory hallucinations brought on by stress. That's the way she'd have to process it. Escaping a serial killer is a big enough deal; no need to throw paranormal activity into the mix.
###
     At least that's how Paula Winston explained it to the other 43 who were hurt that Laura forgot about them.
    It was easier for all of them to remember themselves after their escape. Full names, addresses, and even places of work came flooding in, with few mix ups. Aubrey Jameson became the pilot as they unfurled the Ball and flattened into Blanket, flying across the night sky like a giant stingray. John was copiloting, due to the fact that Ball was his idea. Despite now having a leadership hierarchy, their newfound sense of selves divided the ranks. They were far less effective without a common goal.
###
    A half-hour later, Laura was giving a statement at a police station. Apparently, the man was dead by the time authorities arrived. Laura didn't really know what to say, there were so many things that didn't make sense. She stayed in town while they excavated the death trap, and a little longer than that. Laura was eventually hired by the state department and bought the land previously owned by one Miles D. Jacobs, aka Heartland' s Horror. It became a hub for locating and identifying missing persons in a coalition among 12 states. Where the concrete cages were located became a Memorial garden for the 43. The land and Jacob's house went to his nephew, Leo, who sold both and gave the profit to the foundation that created the memorial, along with a heartfelt letter of apology and a generous delivery of flowers, shrubs, and trees for the garden.
    All of this, of course, was after 43 sets of phone calls, body identification, funerals, all of which were attended by 43 ghosts, who frequently traveled in the form of blanket, and who, after kissing sleeping children and dying parents, remained bound together, helping Laura whenever they could, whether she thought she needed it or not.

Illustration:woman in rainbows holding an umbrella, with a sparkly blue blanket winking behind her.

Synopsis:A man traps 43 women in his cellar at an old gas station. They discover how to coalesce into one being for the purpose of revenge. They help 44 escape, but what becomes of the other 43? After they visit children and past lovers they lose focus and are tired of fighting for power. They don't want to go beyond. They don't want to die. They look up 44. She's a local hero and detective. They decide to let her lead them. They help her solve mysteries.

When I told my friend, a writer, that my fantasy novel's main character was an 18-year-old black girl, he cut me off right away.  "You can't do it."  I fought, I resisted, I got defensive, but I knew he was right.  After all, Toni Morrison's Playing in the Dark is one of two reasons I majored in English.  The other reason was the Vietnam War, which I'll elaborate on in another post.  My ancestry is French and Irish. What would I know of the inner life of a teenager raised in Hollywood by her Haitian ex-model mother and Brazilian producer father? But is the question of whether I should write this book a cultural or racial one?  I don't think my hesitation, and my friend's warning, goes much further than skin deep.  Cherie's experience isn't rooted culturally in the African-American community.  Or is it?  How much of her life in Beverly Hills would be different from her blonde besties'? I don't know.  She is a mystery to me. Every bit of her life is a mystery to me, as I have only been to LA once.

The reasons I am writing this book includes the reasons it shouldn't be written at all. I don't know if I can pull it off.  I don't know if I will make some egregious errors that I am inherently blind to, by my whiteness.  It's entirely possible.  Probably probable. Caucasian writers have created characters of color for years, that is nothing new.  But how successfully?  There is a range.  Zora Neale Hurston, whom I consider my literary grandmother, for her writing has most changed my life, has most given me permission, no, an invitation, to write, was horrendously panned for her attempt at writing about a Southern white couple in Seraph on the Suwannee.  This is her one piece I can't bring myself to read. Ironically, I should read it immediately before I get any further inFaerieWolf.  We are all limited by the lens through which we see the world, and that lens gets manipulated and distorted based on how society treats us.  I can take a hammer to my lens, and try to see the world through a myriad of perspectives, but it is my eyes, always, peering through.

The problem is, I don't just want to write a book about Cherie, who appeared to me, fully formed, on Ft. Myers Beach, I want to write her successfully.  I want Cherie to be seen clearly by the reader for the person she is, not just the things about her.  There are pieces of her that I don't really understand, can't really relate to.  She is, after all, a fictional character, and not me.  Most of those pieces have nothing to do with race, ethnicity, or culture.  They have to do with her personal worldview and the way she interacts with the world around her.  Our race, ethnicity, and culture inform who we are as people, but they are not who we are as people.  We do not exist in homogenous groups based on demographics. 

At the end of the day, we all write what we know.  But we challenge ourselves as well.  Isn't that what writing's about? Challenging the norms of the day? Seeking to elicit some fragment of truth within ourselves and share it with the world? Find one, just one, honest sentence? What I know of the world, the story I choose to tell that world has to do with many things, not simply race.  This is not just a fantasy novel about a black female heroine written by a white female writer.  That's something about it, but it's just one thing.

Feeling Wonky

A change in events for my dear boy put the brakes on the steam locomotive that was my writing momentum this summer.  Writing is too often the thing I say I'll get to when I have time.  A recent accident (we're okay) jarred me back to reality: Not writing will not prolong my life.  I will not get an extension to my deadline.  So, time or no, it's back to the page.  School's back in.  That's okay.  I have commited to writing when my students do.  At the very least, I have not given myself permission to stop writing until Winter Break.  It's like exercise--you can't wait to make time for it.  Either you do or you don't.  Hence, I have mixed running quotes in with my writing quotes-to inspire and energize myself as well as my students.  In the wise words of one athletic company:

Just Do It.