NaBloPoMo

The month of November is ending today, so it's time to reflect on how I did with NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month). I didn't post every day, but this is my fortieth post this month, so I think it all evens out. In this post I reflected that such a month is really unnecessary for a compulsive writer like myself, and perhaps NaQuiBloPoMo would be more appropriate (National Quit Blog Posting Month). So maybe I'll try to cut back in December. We'll see how I do at that.

Back to School

I'm not going to lie: I enjoyed having five days off in a row. The Thanksgiving holiday, and the extra opportunity to spend time with family and friends, was wonderful, and having another day off on Monday, though I was sorry for the reason for it (election mayhem), was an unexpected treat.

Tomorrow we have school again, though, and I think I'm ready. I'm ready to see the kids and I know they are ready to be back. I can just hear them now whining about how bored they were having to stay home all those days. I know they will be excited to see each other, if not to get back to work.

And it's Official

No school tomorrow. Please pray for Haiti.

Weekend

Since getting home from Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday, I have basically been wearing pyjamas. (I did dress briefly yesterday in honor of a visit from the electrician.) A weekend in pyjamas is generally a good thing, although I was sorry to miss church this morning. Reports on whether people could be on the streets or not varied. Some said there was a ban on all private vehicles; others said only private vehicles could be out. The US embassy advised remaining indoors, and although I don't always turn to the US embassy for advice on my behavior - they tend to overreact - we did what they said this time. Why all this? Just election drama. It appears that many of the candidates are calling for the elections to be annulled. One person was shot out in the Artibonite Valley and there were "clashes" in the south.

Apart from more helicopters going overhead than usual, my neighborhood is quiet, but I am reading reports on Facebook of people protesting in the streets in other areas of the city. It's hard to imagine how an orderly election could have been carried out under the conditions in Port-au-Prince right now. This article talks about polls opening late, about confusion over dead people on the rolls, and people being unsure where to go to vote.

The next question: will there be school tomorrow? Officially yes, but if the unrest increases or gets worse, perhaps it will be canceled. We'll have to wait and see.

Read This

There's nobody quite like Corrigan. Here you can read about how he risked his life to get a Thanksgiving turkey and how he believes that Jesus really is making all things new.

Poetry Friday: Ordinary

On Sunday I mentioned that we would be reading odes in eighth grade this past week. We did, and a couple of kids tried one: I got an ode to water and an ode to chocolate. Good topics. When I started to write my own, though, I couldn't narrow down my thoughts to one object, so I ended up writing an ode to ordinary.


Ode to Ordinary

Praise the tedium of an ordinary day.

Getting up in the morning,
Spreading butter on bread,
Dishes to wash and laundry to fold,
Bickering children with beautiful, dirty faces.

Meetings and emails,
Papers to grade,
Sticky notes and dust.

The regular faces, the regular greetings,
Good moods and bad,
Grumbling about the weather.
Beans and rice for lunch on a green plate.

The sun came up today.
The earth is not quaking under my feet.
I am not in pain.
Dress up and use the good china!

Praise, praise the tedium of an ordinary day.

Ruth, from thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown.blogspot.com

Here's today's Poetry Friday roundup.

Happy Thanksgiving!

This is what I wrote last year about the things for which I was grateful to God. This year I could write the same list, though the order would probably change a bit. I would still put my family first, but my friends would be second. How very, very thankful I am for the people God has put in my life this year. I can't express how thankful.

Every item on this list is so much more valuable to me this year than it was last. The earthquake brought all of my blessings into sharp focus. It takes very little to bring me to tears of gratitude for my survival and for the sheer abundance of my life - far beyond what I need. Thank you, Lord.

Sixth on my list last year was my health. I have a friend going through chemotherapy for ovarian cancer right now, and she wrote a few days ago that anyone who wasn't suffering physical pain should thank God for that fact. I have, every day since I read her words. Freedom from pain is a wonderful gift, and one that could be gone at any moment, one to be appreciated.

This morning I read for the first time these words from Emily Dickinson:

One day is there of the series
Termed "Thanksgiving Day"
Celebrated part at table
Part in memory -

I have many memories on this Thanksgiving Day, mostly of people I lost this year, either to death or other kinds of separation. Laughter and tears are very closely related in my life right now, joy and sorrow, love and pain. I am a bundle of emotions, nerve endings very close to the surface. But the uppermost emotion today is gratitude. The words "Thank you" are much too weak to say what I mean.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of my readers, wherever you are. Hug your friends and family and tell them what they mean to you. Enjoy every blessing God gives you. Believe me when I tell you that you don't know when it could be gone.

Seventh Graders and Books

My seventh graders are writing children's stories, so we've been reading picture books for a while together and talking about how the authors approach the stories, the kinds of stories young children enjoy, and issues of craft. It's a lot of fun - I have to admit that reading aloud is one of my favorite things to do, so I probably chose this unit partly because of that.

This year's seventh grade class is extremely opinionated and not at all shy about expressing those opinions. This week in our three days of school I read three books about people: Miss Rumphius, My Great-Aunt Arizona and Island Boy. They hated all of them, especially the last, which we read today.

"Why does everyone die in these books?" they grumbled. I pointed out that everyone really does die, and not just in these books, but they thought that young children should be spared that knowledge. They found the books depressing, too long, and, as one student always remarks, with not enough explosions.

Another book they hated was Jane Yolen's beautiful Owl Moon. The word "boring" was mentioned more than once.

This class doesn't do lyrical, and it doesn't do melancholy. The specific request for next week is "funny books." But I know that not all kids feel this way. A case in point: myself. My favorite fairy tale as a child was "The Little Mermaid," not the Disney version (far in the future still) but the heartbreaking Hans Christian Andersen original. It made me sad, but in a pleasurable way, and I loved the language of it. I cried when I read Little Women at about ten, not a few tears but deep, racking sobs. And then I reread the book countless times until I almost had it memorized.

I guess you could draw the conclusion that I was (and perhaps still am) strange. I wouldn't read those stories to this class, for sure. Instead I choose the funniest, most action-packed read-alouds I can find. I just finished Carl Hiaasen's Flush with them, and they liked it a lot. Now I'm reading What Child is This?: A Christmas Story, by Carolyn Cooney, a book about foster children. So far the kids are a bit grumpy about this one; it does tend toward the lyrical, and there are a lot of characters, something they find confusing. But I'm persevering because it's a good book and eventually everything will come together for them, I hope.

Mighty to Save

We sang this song in Chapel this morning.

We sang this the night of the earthquake, in the chapel. We all felt we needed to get together and pray, and sing, but we didn't end up staying in there long because the ground kept shaking and it felt much safer to be under the sky.

I remember singing, "Our Savior, He can move the mountains." Ben commented that he thought it was a little soon after an enormous earthquake to start singing about moving mountains. Then he said, "Excuse me, I always deal with stress by making inappropriate jokes." I think of that every time I sing the song now.

But there's much more in this song. Here are the words:

Everyone needs compassion
Love that’s never failing
Let mercy fall on me
Everyone needs forgiveness
The kindness of a Savior
The hope of nations

Savior
He can move the mountains
For my God is mighty to save
He is mighty to save
Forever
Author of salvation
He rose and conquered the grave
Jesus conquered the grave

So take me as You find me
All my fears and failures
Fill my life again
I give my life to follow
Everything I believe in
Now I surrender

Shine Your light and
Let the whole world see
We’re singing
For the glory of the risen King
Jesus

Mockingjay

I finally finished Mockingjay this morning. I'm not sure why it took me so long. If anything, this is the fastest-paced of the three books. While the first and second books take their time setting the scene and developing character (though they are both full of heart-pounding action), this one felt much more rushed.

(Warning: spoilers ahead, if you haven't read the first two books.)

The book opens with Katniss making a return trip to District 12, which has been destroyed. She lives now in District 13 along with Gale and all the other survivors from District 12, except for Peeta, who has been captured by the Capitol. Peeta is being used as a propaganda tool by the Capitol and District 13 wants to use Katniss the same way if only she will agree.

Large parts of this book read like a description of a video game, and I think that will appeal to many of my students. But I'm not sure what they are going to think of the ending. To me it felt inevitable, and I was glad that Collins had the courage to follow through. I know that's cryptic, but I can't spoil it for you - go read it yourself!

I have read reviews that criticize this book for being too anti-war but to me this is the beauty of the series. Katniss learns about the futility of violence and hatred and deals with the terrible consequences of both. When people dehumanize each other and see other human beings as less than themselves, everyone suffers. There's not a way to sugar-coat this idea, and Collins doesn't even try. Heavy stuff for adolescents, and yet this is the way the world is. This dystopic series is well worth reading and discussing.

This was book #65 of 2010.

This post is linked to the November 27th edition of the Saturday Review of Books.

Odes

We're going to look at some odes this week in eighth grade. To me this seems a great way to celebrate Thanksgiving, to read some of Pablo Neruda's joyous praise of ordinary objects. I wish I could read them in Spanish, but I enjoy them very much in English.

You can read some of Neruda's odes here and here and here.

I think I'll try to write an ode this week. There are so many things to praise.

Earthquakes are Taboo

Today I was playing Taboo with my English Enrichment class and a student gave this clue: "This happened in Haiti ten months ago."

Seriously? Even in Taboo, there's an earthquake?

Poetry Friday: I dwell in Possibility and Wave

Lately, the facts of life in Haiti - tents, storm, cholera, riots - have been extremely depressing. But there's more to life than facts, right?

I dwell in Possibility
by Emily Dickinson

I dwell in Possibility --
A fairer House than Prose --
More numerous of Windows --
Superior -- for Doors --

Of Chambers as the Cedars --
Impregnable of Eye --
And for an Everlasting Roof
The Gambrels of the Sky --

Of Visitors -- the fairest --
For Occupation -- This --
The spreading wide of narrow Hands
To gather Paradise --


I love this picture of gathering Paradise. There is so much beauty around us in the world and in other people. Possibility is a wonderful place to dwell.

For Emily Dickinson, gathering Paradise involved writing, and it does for me, too. (Not that I put myself in her league, or even anywhere near her league.) The other day I was overwhelmed by waves of emotion: fear, pain, love, gratitude. I felt almost that those emotions came from outside me. I closed my eyes and felt buffeted by them, unable to do a thing about it. But since I dwell in Possibility, I decided to write about it. Here's what I had at the end of my free period:


Wave

Floating on my back,
Face baking body cool,
Trusting the ocean to hold me up,
Mind empty of thought.

Without warning the wave submerges me.
I'm underwater,
Full of water,
Crushed by water.
Slammed into the sand,
Pinned down by a force outside myself,
A power that dwarfs my efforts to escape.
I struggle for air,
Claw towards the surface,
Where I will be myself again
Instead of nothing but a desire to survive.

How can you speak of controlling this wave?
This wave of pain-grief-love,
This wave that flings me onto the beach,
Gasping and covered with seaweed?

by Ruth from thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown.blogspot.com


I have no illusions that this is a great poem or even a good one, but oh, I felt so much better after writing it. I felt more able to deal with myself and my surroundings. As I've said before on this blog, you can do what you want with words, move them around as you choose; not so people or circumstances. I can't control those waves of emotion but I can control what I do with them. It's part of gathering Paradise, writing it down, the good and the bad, the beautiful and the unbearable.

Here's today's Poetry Friday roundup.

Vertières Day

Today we have the day off school to celebrate Vertières Day. Vertières was a decisive battle in the Haitian struggle for independence against the French. This site, which plays a loud, bombastic version of the Haitian national anthem, calls the battle "one of the most horrifying battles ever fought in the history of the world," which, if you think about it, is really saying something. Here's some more information about what happened.

This is the first year that I've been admitting on my blog that I'm in Haiti, and I'm enjoying being able to tell you, my readers, about the holidays here.

Wednesday

I've skipped three days of posting. It's a disgrace, especially when Haiti is in the news again. And once again, not for a good reason.

So you can go read about that if you want, but this morning I'm reading about children's books. Specifically, the nine most subversive ones ever published. It's not what you think!

And speaking of subversive, Kelly Gallagher won't teach to the test. I mean, honestly. What can you do with a teacher like that?

Both of these articles, and lots more, came in my weekly email from the NCTE. I know about what's going on around me in this country, and my students write about it and talk about it. We talk about it together, and grieve and pray for Haiti. But some days I just have to choose to focus my energies where I can make a difference: in my own classroom. If my students learn to think more clearly and express themselves more forcefully, can the world be better in the future? I don't know, but I sure hope so.

Mangoes and Haiti

Photo Credit: wholefoodsmarket.com

In 2008, I described eating a mango for lunch and the ensuing mess. Back in 2006, I wrote this post called Joy is a Mango. I wrote:

The other day I went into the auditorium at my daughter's school and saw that they have put up a large fruit at the front to represent each of the fruit of the spirit. I laughed when I saw that joy was a mango. How perfect. Of course joy is a mango, as its juice runs down your chin and its sweetness fills you up. Joy is extravagant and cheery and so is a mango. Joy sustains us through tough times, and hey, a mango does a good job of that too. It's good for you and delicious too.

Today I read this article about Haitian mangoes, which does a good job of capturing some of the delight and frustration of this country I love so much.

Ten Months

Today marks ten months since the earthquake in Haiti. If you watch the video at this site, you can see a graphic representation of how many aftershocks there were during the first month after the initial quake. Those have slowed (although apparently there was a small one yesterday), but the metaphorical aftershocks are still happening. Grief, pain, and fear still shake us.

And then there is the cholera. This article does a good job of showing the impact of this terrible illness.

I recently read that now 4% of the rubble has been cleared. When you consider that in my nine month anniversary post I said that 2% had been cleared, you can appreciate that the cleanup has been getting faster. However, there is still much work to be done.

I wonder which memories will last the longest if I am fortunate enough to reach an age where I begin to forget even the most intense moments of my life. Will I remember scenes from boarding school? What about my wedding day? Surely the births of my babies will be among the last memories to go. But I think the night that will stick with me the longest, even if all my other memories fade, will be January 12th, 2010, lying shivering on the soccer field with my husband and children, sick with fear, feeling the earth tremble beneath us again and again.

Today it has been ten months since that day. Every day I grieve in some way the losses of the earthquake, whether it is while reading something written by one of my students or while talking to a friend or while looking around me and seeing the evidence that still remains of the destruction. But every day, too, I delight in my continuing life, and the many gifts that God has given me. I take none of them for granted.

Poetry Friday: "as if death were nowhere in the background"

The cholera epidemic continues, and gets worse, and yet in the midst of it all there are many moments that are beautiful and filled with joy - joy in my family, my friends, my students. I almost feel guilty for being happy when so many are miserable, but I know that these days are to be seized.

So while it's a day of suffering in Port-au-Prince, it's also, in a strange way, a good day for a poem about peaches.

"From Blossoms," by Li-Young Lee, ends this way:

O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into
the round jubilance of peach.

There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.


You can read the whole thing here.

Death is always, always somewhere in the background. Except when it's in the foreground. And yet life is filled with so much beauty, so many perfect gifts from God. I'm grateful. "From joy to joy to joy."

Here's today's Poetry Friday roundup.

Cholera Continues

This is a heartbreaking article.

Missed a Day

Oh no! I just realized I didn't post at all yesterday! So much for my NaBloPoMo ambitions!

Well, sorry. I was too busy reading Mockingjay.