Dog, but I’m tired.

The beginning of the semester is a funny time. I love it, but it flat wears me out.

I’m not really sure just how to put into words how much I love my job. I’ve often said that I can’t believe I get paid for this. I’ve said that I would do it even if I didn’t get paid (but please don’t tell the president). I’ve said it’s my calling, my passion, and just about better than a Stuffed Pork Chop with a side of cheese grits, purple-hulled peas and bread pudding from Tim’s Cajun Kitchen.

I love teaching. Having the opportunity to help people learn to love writing or to think critically about something they’ve never considered before is, easily, the greatest job I can possibly imagine.

I’m not kidding.

And the beginning of the semester is the best. All these long faces walk dejectedly into the room, dreading the next 16 weeks cause they didn’t know they would have to take a writing class! Then I’m just on looking for a way to resurrect the love of language in my students. (Being on is really hard for an off-the-scale introvert like me. That’s why I’m so tired right now.)

Cause you see, I love writing. Finding a way to put these disparate thoughts down on the page (or web, in this case) beats away the exhaustion that being on causes.

It’s like that feeling of the first cool breeze of fall when you’re out cutting the grass for what you hope is the final time of the summer.

It’s like waking in the middle of the night feeling like you’ve slept for years, and you notice you still have five hours before you have to get up.

It’s like hearing your boy say, “I love yooooooou” for the first time.

Writing brings clarity to love, to life, to light.

And it’s a light that must, absolutely must, be shared.

As Bill Wheeler says, “Good writing is clear thinking made visible.” And dear god if there’s one thing we need more of in this world it is the light of clear thinking that’s right out there in the open for all to see.

It’s a good day when I can share that with just one other person. It’s a great one when I can share it with a hundred.

The post It’s A Good Day When . . . appeared first on Geek Palaver.

Going . . .

I never wanted to become Polonius: spouting off advice to Laertes and Ophelia when all they wanted was to receive his blessing so they could leave. All I can say is that it started as sort of a joke, but I’ve since realized that it’s much more than a joke to my little girl. And it’s much more than that to me.

Every morning I have the distinct honor of taking my children to school. It’s a blessing that, despite having to circumnavigate two school’s car lines, I would never give up. It gives me just a little more time with both of them in the morning to remind them that I love them and to remind me that there are far more important things in life than papers to grade and bills to pay. Other than tucking them in at night, it is my favorite time of the day. Strange what having kids will do to you; I used to hate the morning commute.

Anyway, each morning I drop the girl off about a block away from school so she can walk in. She LOVES doing this, and it gives me a few more stolen seconds to hug and watch her grow.

And it breaks my heart fresh each morning when she turns to walk away. It’s the reverse of all those stupid car commercials that show the dad talking to a five-year old as she waits, somewhat patiently, behind the wheel for the keys so she can go out. When my girl turns away and starts walking, my seven-year old is suddenly seventeen, complete with a toss of her hair over her shoulder. And I’m left wondering where the time went. (Yep, I was once told by my college Drama professor that if he were to do a production of Hamlet that he would have to cast me in the lead. I was the definition of melancholy. At the time, I took it as a compliment rather than a curse. Strange kid was I.)

Anyway, back to Polonius. I decided one morning to offer my Ophelia (minus the insanity, that is) a bit of advice as she walked away in hopes that she would wait a little longer to turn her back on me and transform into a teenager that I’m having trouble connecting with. As she walked backwards away from me, I looked her in the eye and said, “Learn everything you can.” To which she replied, “Okay.”

Not wanting her to turn, I added, “Have fun!” As she takes another step away from me, she shouts with a grin, “Okay!”

Desperate to keep her eyes on mine a little longer, I reminder her to “tell Mrs. Wrenn thank you and give her BIG HUGS (thank you teletubbies!).” She’s so far down the sidewalk now that she has to shout, “Okay, dad!”

going . . .

“Be nice to your friends!” “Okay.”

“Be nicer to your not so friends!” “I will.”

Knowing now that I’ve got to cut the strings or I’ll be crying all the way to drop off the boy, I shout (to the great pleasure of those sleeping in the house we’re parked in front of I’m sure), “Always remember that I’m proud of you, and I love you!”

At this, she grins, and I die a little inside cause I know she’s about to turn, but before she does, she shouts, “I love you, too, Dad!”

And with that I climb back into the car with tears rolling down my cheeks anyway.

“Be nicer to your not so friends.” I came up with that, as with most things by my seat-pants flying, but other than our “I love yous,” I think it may be the most important of my proverbs. Yeah, I totally stole it from the Gospel of Matthew, but that’s okay, I always did think that Picasso was right about stealing. It’s the one thing that I try to remember myself through the day. And it’s the one thing that I forget the quickest. My memory really sucks.

Be nicer to your not so friends. If we love our children and our friends, what credit is that to us? Doesn’t everyone do the same? The truth is that if we really want to make the world a better place for our kids (and we do), then we’ve got to step up to the bullies and be nicer. We’ve got to step up to the despots and be nicer. We’ve got to reach across the aisle and be nicer. We’ve got to hold our arms open wide in one of my daughter’s patented “air hugs” and be nicer to those whom we don’t like, we don’t love, we can’t stand the sight of, we think even God hates.

We’ve got to be nicer to our not so friends in this world because it’s the only way that we’ll survive to see our little girls grow up into beautiful young women ready to change the world with their dreams. We have got to be nicer to the world.

To that young woman, my daughter, I have only this to add: No matter what people try to tell you, love will change the world.

And always remember that I’m proud to be your daddy.

. . .

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The Dark Knight wishes you a good one.

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A thousand times a day, I have a reason to hate autism. When he’s bouncing on the trampoline, laughter peeling from his small frame, and the laughter turns to shrieks in between bounces for no apparent reason; I hate autism. When I try taking him into a store, and he starts pounding his head with his fists; I hate autism. When I want to talk to him about why he loves the Tigger Movie so much, I hate autism. When he’s carrying on a conversation in a language that I can’t understand, I hate autism. When he cries at night, and I can’t ask him about his nightmare; I hate autism. When his sister asks me when he will talk, and all I can say is “soon, baby, soon;” I hate autism. When another boy his age asks me to throw him a ball, while he bounces alone in his own world, I hate autism.

A thousand times a day.

And then comes a new day like yesterday at the park.

Matthew’s exploring. Here’s a stick; here’s a piece of bark. Together they open new words for him. I only wish I could see them as he does, but then we never get to do that, do we?

I look for Emma. She’s running with some kids and having fun. It’s a nice day. I’m not loving autism; I’ll never go there. But for some reason neither is it in the fore of my thoughts right now. Which in itself is strange. I usually notice it more at the park but not today. Today he’s happy. Today she’s happy. It’s beautiful, and I don’t think about it.

She’s wondered off out of the circle, so I go to look. Matthew has decided to climb the slide. Once I spot her, I turn back to him. He’s standing at the base of the slide, talking to the stick and the bark; ignoring the child standing behind him–throwing bark at his head.

Lord of the Files is not a good book to read when you have young children. Having kids brings you in close proximity the playground: the most vicious place on earth; unless of course there’s a deserted island somewhere near. There once was a time when 1984 held place of priority for the most realistically frightening novel ever. In college, I could see Big Brother everywhere. Having returned to the playground later in life, I’m convinced that Jack and his hunters are far more terrifying.

The child bent to pick up another piece of bark to throw when he heard me approaching, and like Jack on the beach when the sailors arrived, he looked to see if I would stop him. All it took was a look and the bark hit the ground, but it didn’t end there.

I pick up my boy off the slide, and put him on the ground. As soon as I do, I see that he’s heading straight towards a florescent green softball that an older child has dropped. As I move to explain to him that the ball isn’t his, the older child says, “he can play with it.” I’m grateful for the Ralphs of the world. They’re not perfect, but they do exist, and sometimes they do the right thing.

“Thanks buddy. I’ll make sure you get it back.”

My boy bounces it on the sidewalk liking the sound it makes. Up and down, he’s happier than he’s been all day. Until Jack sees him having fun.

Drop, bounce, bounce, bounce. Drop, bounce, bounce, bounce. And Jack attacks. He rushes past my boy on the next drop, and kicks the softball into the parking lot. My boy stands and looks at it rolling away.

I go retrieve the ball from the lot and give it back to my boy. He picks up where he left off, and Jack gets warmed up to kick it again when his mother calls him down for it, “Matthew! Stop!”

He doesn’t stop, and the ball goes back into parking lot. And my Matthew watches it go before bending over to pick up a new stick and a new piece of bark. Bouncing into his own world.

There are times, they are few but they do happen, when autism isn’t the worse thing in the world.

The terrifying thing about Lord of the Flies is that we’re all Piggy. We’re all Ralph. We’re all Jack. We’re all floundering between the two Matthews. And Simon the innocent is punished for our sins.

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When his life was ruined, his family killed, his farm destroyed, Job knelt down on the ground and yelled up to the heavens, “Why god? Why me?” and the thundering voice of God answered, “There’s just something about you that pisses me off.”

–Stephen King

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Ghost stories around a campfire. It all started with ghost stories around a campfire.

We were young, so it was just easier to re-tell the scenes from Friday the 13th, but they were still effective. Most of us hadn’t even seen the movie, but there was always that one kid whose parents would take him to the R-raters. The one kid who could spread the thirteen different ways a psychotic could kill you in the woods; supposing, of course, that you needed killing. My favorite was the arm coming out from under the cot, holding the head of the guy who just had the misfortune of having had pre-marital sex.

What idiot came up with idea of bed skirts? Didn’t they understand (as Stephen King said once) that the skirt makes a perfect hiding place for the boogie man (and a child’s imagination)?

Eventually we moved away from retelling the movie to simply chanting “che he he, ha ha ha.” Fear is more contagious than the flu.

Which left us, alone, in our tents, with only our imaginations and the sounds of the living, breathing, thinking world around us.

A place to tell stories. A place to let the imagination run wild. A place to indulge that little boy who wants a new toy. A place to put away childish things and think like a man (“or a woman if you are one”). That’s what the campfire was for me. That’s what Geek Palaver is for me now.

Yes, I am a geek, and I want to talk. Sometimes it will be useless chatter. Occasionally our palaver will be interesting and helpful. Rarely, the counsel might be inspiring, but we will have a place to discuss our opinions. To see the world as it is, and as we hope it will be.

Perhaps to discover our destiny: our ka.

Join us around the campfire as we bring the 19th century into the 21st.

This has all happened before, for Ka, is a wheel.

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