Strictly weedcentric

After a week of essay-reading, a day in transit, and three days of working indoors while waiting for the rain to stop, I woke to find a lovely clear day and bounded right down to the garden to see what's up.

Short answer: everything. I picked radishes and lettuce this morning but left some lovely heads of broccoli to mature for a few more days, and while weeding the carrot patch, I accidentally pulled up an infant carrot. There's no point in wasting a perfectly good carrot no matter how small, so I brushed off the dirt and popped the baby carrot into my mouth. Sweet and earthy, with a tangy aftertaste. I want more!

And it looks like I'll get my wish, provided that I can make some headway against the weeds. Yes, I'm entering the weedcentric part of my summer: stoop and pull, stoop and pull, stoop and pull some more. I'd hoped to get some hoe action today but hoeing wet ground is a hassle. But hey, I'll hoe some mo' tomorrow. (Stop me before I start to rap!)

The next big chore is tying up tomato plants to stakes, a great opportunity to spend some time inhaling the wonderful aroma that carries the promise of tomatoes. With my hands in the dirt, the sun on my back, and the taste of baby carrot in my mouth, I could work out there forever.

Or until the flies start biting--whichever comes first.

 

 



 

Entering the Sexist-Car-Salesman Circle of Hell

Twenty-five years ago in Kentucky I was looking at cars when a salesman, an older guy in a seersucker suit, put a patronizing hand on my arm and said, "Well now honey, why don't you come back when your husband can come with you?"

I didn't, needless to say. I bought a car elsewhere. But that was 25 years ago! In Kentucky! Surely times have changed!

Not much.

So I'm trying to buy a car. My Volvo's transmission is getting ready to fail (maybe tomorrow, maybe next week, maybe next year) and while I love my Volvo, I draw the line at putting a new transmission in a car with 258,000 miles on it. (And no cup holders.) So I have started looking for a new(er) car, a process that might take months but that starts with visits to a few car lots so I can see what's out there at what kind of price.

I intend to do some serious online searching soon, but first I wanted to get some face-time with various models, to get a good look at back seats and slam some doors to see how solid the cars feel. So I went to a used-car lot, where I got a lot of attention from a very pleasant salesperson who actually listened to what I was asking for (unlike the guy back in Kentucky, 25 years ago, who, after I told him I wanted a used minivan, showed me a new Thunderbird). 

Then I went to the local Toyota dealership. Big mistake. I wandered around looking at very nice cars for a good 20 minutes, and I even told an official-looking person that I need to buy a car (in case it wasn't obvious from the rattletrap nature of my current ride), but he just smiled pleasantly and walked away. I assumed he was going inside to alert a salesperson to my needs, but no one ever came anywhere near me.

It's true that I was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and it's true that my husband didn't come with me (because this is my car I'm looking for--and besides, he's out of town), and it's true that a person who drives an 18-year-old beater might not appear to be in a position to purchase a car, but guess what? I'm still a customer.

Or I could have been if they hadn't ignored me.

Back home for the win!

Nothing against Louisville, but I'm happy to be home! Top ten reasons:

10. Fresh lettuce from the garden and home-grown horseradish on bratwurst for lunch.

9. A list of chores--pruning azaleas, pinching basil buds, weeding rows of beans--that will take me out into the sunshine (as soon as the rain lets up).

8. A whole family of house finches gathering around the birdfeeder all at once.

7. Hopeful's expectant expression after she corners a chipmunk just out of reach and waits for it to fall or leap back into chasing range.

6. Reading the Sunday Columbus Dispatch on my comfy sofa is SOOOO much more pleasant than reading student essays in a big harshly-lit room full of straight-backed chairs.

5. Especially if I'm also listening to the Cleveland Indians on the radio.

4. With AP grading behind me, I can look ahead and plan our next canoeing outing and a visit to baby Elizabeth.

3. My son's new haircut and his quirky take on news of the world.

2. I may not have piles of pillows or invisible maids to fluff them up, but there's nothing better than sleeping in my very own bed.

1. With my very own husband.

Nestled in the nexus of vectors

I sit in a sofa suspended above the street and contemplate the vectors of motion surrounding me. 

I'm in a sofa, yes, and stationary, but all around me I see movement. The sofa stands on a stretch of carpet that looks like the result of an explosion at a paint factory, and the carpet covers the floor of a walkway stretching above Fourth Street to connect the two towers of the Galt House. I'm facing roughly east(ish) while a steady stream of AP readers and others walk or saunter or limp or scuttle east or west, some stopping to sit or chat or belly up to the bar across the way.

Below me traffic moves north and south, and up above I see in the Galt House windows reflections of clouds looking like the sails of tall ships blowing past.  Sometimes a rising elevator slices through the sails.

To my left a group of fuzzy pastel pocket quail flutter about without any apparent awareness of traffic patterns or prevailing winds. They sit and roost or swirl and spiral, ensconced within their own little world.

I came here seeking isolation, a perverse desire considering that I sit at the nexus of so many vectors of motion, but the random human chatter and movement create a bubble of white noise I find oddly soothing. Today I read 325 essays, a feat that left me bereft of all sense. Last night my rooommate and I drove south to hike in a research forest,  stretching our muscles and resting our eyes on woods and water and swooping purple martins,  but today I begged off any more activity. Instead, I sit ensconced in my bubble and consider the quail.
 

My portable happy place

When my eyes grow blurry and my mind grows dull and I find myself reading the same paragraph over and over and over, I look up from my stack of student essays at the framed photo standing in front of me and I silently plead, "Help me, Baby-Wan. You're my only hope!"

Bringing along a photo of my daughter and granddaughter is the smartest thing I've done for this AP reading. Inside the room are hundreds of people silently nodding over essay after essay after essay, some inspired and some quite good but many simply mediocre, and I turn into a grading machine, open read read read shut bubble open the next one and start over, so it's easy to get sucked into the fog and haze and lose touch with reality.

But then I look up and see my adorable daughter and granddaughter and I'm transported to a world full of smiles and wiggles and overwhelming cuteness, and it's a very happy place. That's where you'll find me when the haze starts settling in. Don't look at the essays--look at the baby. Smile at the baby. Sometimes I think I see her smiling back.

How to make a room full of English teachers laugh until they cry

Invite Taylor Mali to perform his poem "The The Impotence of Proofreading" (read it here--although it's better in performance).

I ought to insert a [sic] into that title, but I would need a [sic] for every line of the poem (and sometimes several per line) and I can't [sic] that many [sic]s on poor Taylor's poem.
 

Settling into my secret mission

So here I am once again huddled together with a thousand or so people in an undisclosed location (Louisville) performing clandestine tasks (reading essays) for an unmentionable organization (AP), and I can't really say what I'm reading about but I'm seeing much more variety than I did in last year's essays and for that I can only say Hurrah.

In fact, Louisville is better all around this year, and not just because I know what I'm doing this time. The weather is better--hot but not too muggy, with a nice cooling breeze so I can walk along the river without melting (although the traffic sounds are still annoying).  I have a terrific roommate and some really fun tablemates, and AP gave us fleece blankets to keep the chill off in the big horrible reading room. 

So I'm surviving. So far. One day in and I haven't run screaming from the room--yet. Kind of getting the hang of it. In fact, I don't want this to get out but I may actually enjoy this work. So far. Ask me again a week from now and I may have another story entirely. If I'm able to speak at all.