Literary Festival, Son in big City, Still things to do before graduation
It is a little over two weeks from graduation (or in my case, a "hooding" ceremony) and I am, for some reason, moving in slow motion. I suppose the "wildflower walk" class I conducted, as part of my Appalachia in the Media class, had me a bit stressed. I worried about who would (or wouldn't ) show up, I worried about the weather (dark and threatening), I worried about the activity and if we would have time for it, I worried about the guide books. Too much worrying, and now it has me tired, here on a Friday in the college library, where it is dark out and rain is threatening. AGAIN.
But most of the class, and my supervising professor and her retired forestry expert husband, showed up. It would drizzle a few minutes here and there, but they had time to look up the names or flowers and then note where they were on a "map" I had they put numbers on. They skipped the sketching of the flowers (most were tiny anyway) and we had time to look for bugs and moving "macroinvertebrates" in a very shallow creek running through the town park. And John, the ecological-forestry expert, was able to find at least one "caddis fly" stone casing, glued to the underside of a rock in the stream and there to protect this delicate larva. He also spied a salamander, but it quickly escaped into the stream and beyond.
Now all that is left is a short "sum up" of my experience teaching for my professor, in writing, evaluations of my classmates' "nature writing" assignments, and a 12-14 page paper for my Modern Native American Literature. That's all, then I'll be able to graduate.
Youngest son emailed me he was going to go to an "Earth" Day event in his section of the big city of Pittsburgh. We misses what we used to have in our little town: after 2 hours of town cleanup, free pizza and soda, and if you found a plastic bottle painted orange you also won ten dollars! And they also had drawings for money too! How many towns do that to get kids to do litter pickup? I hope he gets some good freebies at this city event, and hope he talks to some people. He is a lone wolf and I worry about him and hope he is not feeling lonely.
I received a few inspiring hints on writing from some regional authors at our 2nd annual Appalachian Events Literary Festival. And at the English Club meeting the following week some people pointed out two authors, surprisingly, had diverging views on people in Appalachia and they were surprised these two women weren't at each other's throats!
It was even more interesting in my night class when classmates "poohed-poohed" some of the work of an English club male member (we won't say who), who had 'several' poems in the just printed annual literary journal. Yeah-- several, like he's king or something. I submitted a cute drawing of a tree and a cute little poem to go with it. Of course it didn't get accepted. It was all "young people moaning about life" stuff. At my age, I'm happy to have any life and so don't toss out all my negative "ickness" on others in poems. They think a lot of obscure, incongruous descriptions are what makes a poem great. I should come up with something vague and stupid too. Or, sometimes, they come up with something that is "very" obvious and not obscure at all. I guess I will never be a real poem, so I'll stick more with nonfiction or long fiction, like a novel. Short things I don't do well with. Ah well.
But most of the class, and my supervising professor and her retired forestry expert husband, showed up. It would drizzle a few minutes here and there, but they had time to look up the names or flowers and then note where they were on a "map" I had they put numbers on. They skipped the sketching of the flowers (most were tiny anyway) and we had time to look for bugs and moving "macroinvertebrates" in a very shallow creek running through the town park. And John, the ecological-forestry expert, was able to find at least one "caddis fly" stone casing, glued to the underside of a rock in the stream and there to protect this delicate larva. He also spied a salamander, but it quickly escaped into the stream and beyond.
Now all that is left is a short "sum up" of my experience teaching for my professor, in writing, evaluations of my classmates' "nature writing" assignments, and a 12-14 page paper for my Modern Native American Literature. That's all, then I'll be able to graduate.
Youngest son emailed me he was going to go to an "Earth" Day event in his section of the big city of Pittsburgh. We misses what we used to have in our little town: after 2 hours of town cleanup, free pizza and soda, and if you found a plastic bottle painted orange you also won ten dollars! And they also had drawings for money too! How many towns do that to get kids to do litter pickup? I hope he gets some good freebies at this city event, and hope he talks to some people. He is a lone wolf and I worry about him and hope he is not feeling lonely.
I received a few inspiring hints on writing from some regional authors at our 2nd annual Appalachian Events Literary Festival. And at the English Club meeting the following week some people pointed out two authors, surprisingly, had diverging views on people in Appalachia and they were surprised these two women weren't at each other's throats!
It was even more interesting in my night class when classmates "poohed-poohed" some of the work of an English club male member (we won't say who), who had 'several' poems in the just printed annual literary journal. Yeah-- several, like he's king or something. I submitted a cute drawing of a tree and a cute little poem to go with it. Of course it didn't get accepted. It was all "young people moaning about life" stuff. At my age, I'm happy to have any life and so don't toss out all my negative "ickness" on others in poems. They think a lot of obscure, incongruous descriptions are what makes a poem great. I should come up with something vague and stupid too. Or, sometimes, they come up with something that is "very" obvious and not obscure at all. I guess I will never be a real poem, so I'll stick more with nonfiction or long fiction, like a novel. Short things I don't do well with. Ah well.