pathos, I has it
It did not bode well for me this morning when I looked in the mirror at the ladies room at work and noticed the prominent red pimple on the very tip of my nose. Which was further reddened by the new day's batch of airborne pollen-driven sneezing and nose blowing. I could be a traffic beacon! To my chagrin I also realized that my gray t-shirt was unsuitable choice for work (though very comfortable, alas) but also framing my torso in the most unbecoming fashion.
The day was downhill from there. The phone calls were insane. The problems intractable. I couldn't get anything done. Aaaah! I left work a little earlier than I usually do because I agreed to substitute for another teacher first hour at Hebrew High, but I soon discovered that traffic flow on the highway is very different at 5 pm than it is around 6pm. What is usually a 20 minute trip took over an hour. I was trapped on the highway interchange cloverleaf, with all the other cars, really hungry and needing to urinate, knowing that I had to leave the house by 6:30pm in order to make it to class by 7pm. "Come on!" I yelled inside my little metal (okay, mostly plastic) box of a vehicle, "Do something!" Alas, the universe does not seem to accede to my immediate demands! Eventually I made it home with enough time wolf down some sustenance, grab my school supplies and lesson plans and get back on the road. This time, I took the streets, but managed to hit every traffic light in Johnson County. I finally made it to Hebrew High, but running a few minutes late.
Hebrew High was the high point of my evening. For my first hour, just in time for Passover, I regaled the kids with tales from the gefilte fish! (aside: With neither fins nor flippers, the gefilte fish swims with great difficulty.) Turns out, the species of fish highly prized in the gefilte fish industry, Asian Carp, is highly invasive and is eating everything in the Great Lakes. I also found a gross and entertaining account of gefilte-fish acquired tapeworm from the NYTimes.
Second hour, I got out the scissors and magazines and gluesticks for my Protecting Creation class and we put together a "Creation" collage. I pulled together several images from my lesson plans (the U.S. lights at night, the great pacific garbage patch, migratory whooping cranes, newly discovered Israeli desert spider, etc), plus a collection of old magazines and set the kids free. We had a really good time and I'm so impressed with the poster they created. I love it! As we were putting together the collage, I tried to see if they remembered the points I tried to drive home from our lessons - got some very strange answers, but I think I may have made some impression.
On a sad note, during lunch today, I was reading the death announcements on the local Jewish funeral home website- (Aside: I just like to know who died. It's a very small community. I might have to go visit.)- and I noticed that a young man, the brother of one of sister's friends had passed away. Immediately, I emailed my sister llama. Then sent a second email...wait, maybe it isn't him, but the dates are right. It's like I didn't want to believe that a young person was dead... that it was really some other person that I didn't know, whose mom didn't drive me on the youth group trip to Omaha or have a parrot or whose brother didn't hang out with me at the Wakarusa music festival in Lawrence an age ago. At Hebrew High, I confirmed that this indeed was the person who passed away, but the funeral was family only, and that they weren't receiving non-family for shiva. It was a very strange, depressing feeling. While deaths are terrible events (and God only knows that for a young person to die suddenly, by whatever means, it has to be pretty horrible), there is a certain comfort for me at least in knowing that people will come out the woodwork to stand with you. But you have to know about it to come out of the woodwork, which I why I read Louis' website daily. (But I'm weird like that.) Anyway, that's weighing heavy on my mind. My sister-llama was a mensch to let me share that with her, but it does have the effect of putting my other worries is perspective.
On a happy note, my worms are still alive! Somehow, they made it through being frozen solid and are still squirming around in my worm bin. I peeked inside out of morbid curiousity when I took out the trash tonight, and they were there, all cozy and compost-y. Frabjous day!
The day was downhill from there. The phone calls were insane. The problems intractable. I couldn't get anything done. Aaaah! I left work a little earlier than I usually do because I agreed to substitute for another teacher first hour at Hebrew High, but I soon discovered that traffic flow on the highway is very different at 5 pm than it is around 6pm. What is usually a 20 minute trip took over an hour. I was trapped on the highway interchange cloverleaf, with all the other cars, really hungry and needing to urinate, knowing that I had to leave the house by 6:30pm in order to make it to class by 7pm. "Come on!" I yelled inside my little metal (okay, mostly plastic) box of a vehicle, "Do something!" Alas, the universe does not seem to accede to my immediate demands! Eventually I made it home with enough time wolf down some sustenance, grab my school supplies and lesson plans and get back on the road. This time, I took the streets, but managed to hit every traffic light in Johnson County. I finally made it to Hebrew High, but running a few minutes late.
Hebrew High was the high point of my evening. For my first hour, just in time for Passover, I regaled the kids with tales from the gefilte fish! (aside: With neither fins nor flippers, the gefilte fish swims with great difficulty.) Turns out, the species of fish highly prized in the gefilte fish industry, Asian Carp, is highly invasive and is eating everything in the Great Lakes. I also found a gross and entertaining account of gefilte-fish acquired tapeworm from the NYTimes.
Second hour, I got out the scissors and magazines and gluesticks for my Protecting Creation class and we put together a "Creation" collage. I pulled together several images from my lesson plans (the U.S. lights at night, the great pacific garbage patch, migratory whooping cranes, newly discovered Israeli desert spider, etc), plus a collection of old magazines and set the kids free. We had a really good time and I'm so impressed with the poster they created. I love it! As we were putting together the collage, I tried to see if they remembered the points I tried to drive home from our lessons - got some very strange answers, but I think I may have made some impression.
On a sad note, during lunch today, I was reading the death announcements on the local Jewish funeral home website- (Aside: I just like to know who died. It's a very small community. I might have to go visit.)- and I noticed that a young man, the brother of one of sister's friends had passed away. Immediately, I emailed my sister llama. Then sent a second email...wait, maybe it isn't him, but the dates are right. It's like I didn't want to believe that a young person was dead... that it was really some other person that I didn't know, whose mom didn't drive me on the youth group trip to Omaha or have a parrot or whose brother didn't hang out with me at the Wakarusa music festival in Lawrence an age ago. At Hebrew High, I confirmed that this indeed was the person who passed away, but the funeral was family only, and that they weren't receiving non-family for shiva. It was a very strange, depressing feeling. While deaths are terrible events (and God only knows that for a young person to die suddenly, by whatever means, it has to be pretty horrible), there is a certain comfort for me at least in knowing that people will come out the woodwork to stand with you. But you have to know about it to come out of the woodwork, which I why I read Louis' website daily. (But I'm weird like that.) Anyway, that's weighing heavy on my mind. My sister-llama was a mensch to let me share that with her, but it does have the effect of putting my other worries is perspective.
On a happy note, my worms are still alive! Somehow, they made it through being frozen solid and are still squirming around in my worm bin. I peeked inside out of morbid curiousity when I took out the trash tonight, and they were there, all cozy and compost-y. Frabjous day!