Disheartened

I'd like to open by asking you what exactly you think would posses a person with a B.S. Ed. and who holds state certifications in Special Education and as a Library Assistant to put 80 miles a day on her car to earn $8.41/hr in order to provide book circulation to two urban elementary schools with a combined collection of 21,000 books and a combined population of roughly 1600 students and 75 teachers?  Allow me to remind you this person performs the job alone.  There is no M.L.S. credentialed librarian.  The folks with advanced degrees were furloughed so those of us hired as "assistants" are doing this job alone....in two schools.

God knows I could find a Special Ed job tomorrow and be paid many times more than what I am currently paid so we can assume it's not the generous compensation for this job.  The thing is, I burned out on the bureaucracy with that job.  I love the kids who struggle for one reason or another.  I love empowering them and helping them find ways to succeed.  I just can't cope with the exhausting amount of legal documentation.  It saps the energy that the kids need in order for me to be effective with them.

I am not enamored of long commutes and even less so since our family has had multiple major automotive issues in the last two months.  I certainly don't enjoy filling my tank two or more times a week and honestly, my pay doesn't really help me do so.  The travel route is congested with a great many aggressive drivers and several construction sites.  Neither of those things help endear the drive to me.

At my two schools I lack basic necessities for my job such as an adult-sized desk and a chair with doesn't collapse under me every time I sit in it.  I've become very adept at the art of the careful landing.  I also sit in a moldy basement in one of the schools.  Hey, who needs air-quality?  What an unnecessary luxury.  Oh right, the air is fine according to all reports (how many palms were greased for that and how many salaries could have been paid instead?) only it's not.

Of course, a case could be made for insanity being the motivation.  These conditions are crazy-making.  It also unnerves my husband on a daily basis that I drive as far as I do to park my car in less than safe neighborhoods to work for so little.  My sanity certainly has been questioned long enough and in multiple contexts by many people so there may be sufficient evidence to convict on that charge.

I submit the main motivation is a soul-deep concern for vulnerable kids and for being involved in their educational process in a way which doesn't suck the life out of me, a desire to support a bone-weary faculty in their daily efforts, and an abiding love and appreciation for the power of books.  There's also the satisfaction that comes from bringing order out of chaos, being able to provide efficient systems for accessing literature and information, and making both students and faculty aware of resources they never knew existed.  Watching a child's eyes light up over something which engages his imagination or answers her questions gives me joy.  Seeing a teacher breathe a sigh of relief over being saved a little time in searching for materials to use in augmenting a lesson gives me a little more energy to continue serving.

I don't see myself as a great savior but I do believe I provide an important service and provide it well.  I believe the context in which I serve is critically important as I am serving students who begin life with too many strikes against them already.  The students in my two schools are the poorest in the city.  They come from homes full of violence, substance abuse, and transience.  They come from homes with a lack of stability, food, and books.  That's not to say every home represented is like this but certainly the demographics indicate there is a disproportionate degree of these attributes.  There will never be a lack of people willing to work in comfortable suburban schools.  It's important to attract capable, hard-working people to the worst situations though.  I am capable and if showing up to do my job well in the midst of dealing with cancer doesn't demonstrate a work ethic, I don't know what does.

Our schools spend a great deal of time and money providing free meals, health clinics, food pantries, clothing closets, after school activities, and other services.  These are important and can make a big difference.  I am in no way suggesting these services cease.  I will say we  must not forget our primary job is to EDUCATE children.  I am deeply concerned that the lack of value placed on our libraries indicates we have forgotten that responsibility.

We have already furloughed the librarians so our students are not receiving instruction as to how to properly use a library and access its treasures or literature and information, nor how to conduct effective online searches for digital information.  We have completely failed them in providing the tools needed for them to engage in self-directed learning in the most expansive resource, the library.  Ray Bradbury said he could not afford to go to college so he went to the library and "graduated" at age 27 after he had read countless volumes.  Our students, who may never be able to dream of affording higher education, will not have a concept that they have the power to educate themselves.  Hell, they probably won't even find out who Ray Bradbury is or have the chance to consider his works for that matter.

Still, I strive because it matters deeply for our students.  When I interviewed for this job I said aside from providing excellent service I wanted to cultivate the library as a safe place.  I am given 20 minutes every other week per class (which is pathetic to begin with) to allow them a sense of this haven, this sacred space for knowledge and imagination.  It's a challenge but one I believe I have risen to.  I cannot contractually provide formal instruction but I can take 20 minutes and do everything in my power to convey that this is a place for hope of finding solace or building a better future....until you evict the students and me from this place.

I am told I am now to "do library on a cart."  I am to distill a 10,000 volume library to a cart which holds fewer books than the average teacher's classroom library, push it from room to room, and call it library service for 900 students and 30-40 faculty.  We've already abandoned library instruction.  If you want me to abandon proper circulation service then you are more insane than I am.  This is a horrendous failure of educational leadership.  If you want library on a cart stop pretending it matters at all.  Delete the entire collection from the catalog, distribute the books to the students and teachers, and take the shelves apart.  I have no interest in perpetrating the fraud of saying library services are provided to our neediest children under such conditions.

Act of a Desperate Mother

I believe I have mentioned that since Calypso and Diana are no longer at home I am swimming alone in a sea of testosterone.  This is frequently manifested in the TV being tuned to football or zombie shows.  Isaac attempts to reassure me  of his enduring affection by telling me he'd totally blast a zombie in the head with a shot-gun to save me or that I'd be welcome in his compound when the zombie plague hits.  Recognizing that different people express love in different ways I understand that in 16 year old boy-speak this is evidence that I am held in high esteem.  I have attempted to repay the kindness by joining him as he watches his new favorite show The Walking Dead.  As much as I adore my son I do NOT enjoy the show even a little.  I have tried.  It's grotesque and horrifying in its excessive depictions of the savagery of both the dead and undead. However, Isaac and Mr. Lime have been anticipating the season premier for months.  That would be tonight...at the same time as the Grammy Awards.

The fellows were out so I put on the Grammys.  When they returned Isaac curled up next to me and enjoyed some of the show but announced at 9pm he'd be watching the zombies.  About the time Rhianna came on stage to perform, he asked if I wanted to change the channel or should he go to the den. Wanting very much to continue to enjoy the presence of my son but NOT endure images of the lumbering, partially-dismembered undead I had to think fast.  As Rhianna pranced around in her slinky outfit I directed his attention to her taut abs revealed by the tight outfit, the curve of her firm backside, and the succulence of her bosom before suggesting he might find that a far more pleasing sight than the aforementioned zombies.

I suggested some of the tasty morsels on the Food Network since it's a channel he regularly enjoys.  I appealed to his seemingly unending hunger and said the gourmet delights (heck, even some of the awful things Andrew Zimmern ingests on Bizarre Foods) would be more enjoyable than rotting brains and innards.  My son was unswayed.

That's right, I sought to arouse lust in the glands of a teenage boy through the visual stimulation of a hot chick writhing on stage in tight clothes.  I hoped to stimulate a desire for food in a young man who sucks down a gallon of milk a day, who makes a batch of pancakes from scratch and eats the entire batch in one sitting...and I FAILED.

Kids today....lust and gluttony just aren't what they used to be.

It's the Great Candy Shakedown, Charlie Brown

I first posted this back in 2005.  Since only about 3 of you were reading me back then I think it's a safe rerun.

Ok, now forgive me as I strap on my old lady gear. I'm in my rocking chair on the front porch, flowered dress, apron, stockings rolled down around my ankles, gray hair in bun, bowl of candy in my lap, wagging my bony finger at the young 'uns coming across my porch for Halloween treats. Back in my day, when we went trick or treating, or "spookin'" (rhymes with book) as they call it where I grew up, we only went to the houses of people we knew. We ALWAYS said 'trick or treat.' People had to guess who we were under our costumes and we had to perform a trick (sing a song, tell a joke, do something funny or clever) before we got to have sweets and goodies dropped into our bags. Sometimes we were invited in for hot cocoa or popcorn balls. We also made our own costumes and said "thank you."

Flash forward to 1994 when I moved to this area. A neighbor warned me in September that I had better start stocking up on candy now. I asked why and was told our neighborhood was the most popular one in the county for trick or treating. Then she told me she spent over $50 a year on Halloween candy to pass out. I thought she was out of her mind. I bought maybe 6 bags of candy, thinking this would prepare me for heavy traffic. I was blissfully unaware of the madness that would ensue.

The first sign of trouble was when I noticed the entire block out decorating all day. I don't mean just putting a few carved pumpkins on porches or hanging skeleton pictures on front doors. I mean elaborate displays. Graveyards sprang up in front yards. Zombies, corpses, skeletons, witches, and various other monsters came out en masse. Landscaping changed dramatically as spiderwebs, severed body parts, and dry ice machines created eerie scenes. Spooky music filled the air. People actually took the day off work to set up!

We ate dinner, got the kids costumed and the doorbell rang. It was a bunch of kids I did not know who stuck their hands out expectantly. "Ok, Happy Halloween." I said with a smile as I dumped a few goodies into their bags. No "thank yous" as they dashed to the neighbor's house.

My kids were pretty small and a little freaked out by some of the more gruesome decorations in the area so Daddy the Protector walked them around the neighborhood while I stayed at the house to hand out candy. The next sign of trouble was when I had a line 20 deep waiting for candy. Crimony! I was new to the neighborhood, I didn't KNOW 20 kids that lived there. Why were parents letting their kids come to me? I could be an axe murderer or have laced the candy with drugs for all they knew!

Our house was a duplex. The guy who lived in the other half looked at my pathetic store of candy and asked if I had more inside the house. I told him no and he shook his head laughing. NOW, I understood. I had been handing out candy for 15 minutes and had about 12 pieces of my 6 bags left and now had a line that was 30 kids deep. When I plopped the last candy bar into a kid's bag and let the rest know I was cleaned out I thought there was going to be a riot! It was like a bunch of refugees pressing a UN truck carrying water and rice. The neighbor asked me to help pass out his candy since I had been wiped out. For the next two hours I sat as an endless stream of costumed kids paraded across our porch like a conveyor belt of items in a factory line. I was astounded.

Apparently every rural kid in the county gets dropped off in that neighborhood. There were easily 1000 kids running through there. I caught on and the next year started stocking up on candy in September. I also figured out, all on my own, what every one else in the neighborhood does too. We buy dum-dum, smarties and other cheap stuff for the hordes of kids we don't know and save the candy bars and good stuff for the kids who live in the neighborhood.

We lived in that neighborhood for 10 years and moved to an outlying area 8 years ago. This neighborhood considers it busy if 6 kids knock on the door.  Tonight I'll be at work but the two neighbor kids will stop and be allowed to take fistfuls from our candy bowl which will later be demolished by those in this house.  Of course, since nature gave us an early trick of 8 inches of snow over the weekend I hope all the little ghosts and goblins have costumes that fit over snowsuits.

Slice of Lime-Driven to Insanity*

I have a choice of three different but reasonably direct routes to work.  They are each very distinct.  One takes a highway.  One takes a main road through town.  One is all back roads.  It's nice to have options because there are frequent accidents (and no I am not the cause or victim of them all, thankyouverymuch).

Early this summer construction began on the highway (and still continues).  Any time the highway gets gnarly the main road through town backs up as folks seek the alternate route.

Then they started digging up the back roads, which also diverts traffic to the main road through town.

Then they decided to tear up the main road...

and trim trees on the main street and the back roads...

and  close down bridges on the highway...

all at the same time.

Did I mention we  live in a tourist area and it's vacation season?

It's been so very special trying to find a way to work lately.

Then yesterday they strangled the road in front of our office to one lane.

I expect tomorrow they will rip up our cul de sac too.  It's just par for the course.

*No Limes were in actual traffic at any time during the shooting of this picture.  This is a dramatic recreation staged in the parking lot of work.  In fact, the key wasn't even in the ignition.  In fact, I had nearly drained my battery to the point of the car being unwilling to start after leaving my lights on because this is not even my own car.  I stole Mr. Lime's car and I'm not terribly familiar with all the controls.  This post is approved by Lime.  Reading of this post may cause severe nostril cramps, chafed knuckles, simple chronic hallitosis, gingivitis, excessive ear hair growth, palpitations, baldness, furry tongue, and personality disorders.  Erections lasting longer then four hours should be examined by me...unless you're a woman or experiencing the other side effects, in which case I'll run screaming out of the room at what a freak you've become.

Crying Uncle

I feel like in recent months I have spent way too much time sharing about maladies and mishaps among my family but here we go again.  Isaac will be having surgery on Thursday to repair a broken thumb.  The x-ray was hideous enough that it required no interpretation from the doctor.  He put it up and before I the doctor opened his mouth I was looking at the thing and thinking, "Oh damn...that's really ugly."  When he opened his mouth it only confirmed I was correct.  Isaac lost baseball season to knee surgery.  He has now lost what remains of football season to hand surgery.  As much as I loathe football (and this injury does NOTHING to improve my opinion of the sport given that it occurred during an away game and the frakking coaches didn't seem to think calling us before they got home was necessary...so really, my opinion of the sport sinks to new depths) I do feel bad for Isaac's great disappointment at loosing yet another sporting season.  I'm also not overly fond of people cutting into any of my babies, even if the "baby" is 8 inches taller than me and has the strength to lift me off my feet.

So just in case anyone has lost count, Isaac had knee surgery in May, followed closely by Mr. Lime having foot surgery.  In the middle of June Calypso was hospitalized during a bout with mono which left her dehydrated.  She was again hospitalized at the end of August with a bacterial infection which required IV antibiotics and that whole episode reactivated her mono so she is still feeling like a dishrag and only able to attend school half days at this point.  Oh, and just in case I think I don't need to be worried about Diana, she called to say she feels flu-ish and her chest is badly congested and breathing is hard.  I told her to get her butt to the college health center.

So once again I find myself asking for prayers, good thoughts, healing energy, anything good you'd be willing to send in the direction of my entire family.  I'm feeling rather weary with having my everyone beset by all this.  However I know things could be worse and I know I need some good stuff to focus on.  To that end, here are the things I am counting a couple days early.

•  My employers have been wonderfully understanding every time I've had a kid with a surgery/admission worthy event.  They don't give me grief about taking time off.  They've also been generous about providing care for us all.
• I have some really great coworkers too.  Some of them are going through some hard times as well and generally we are supportive and encouraging of each other.
• It's a thumb, not a spine or a  brain or heart or lungs or a myriad of other things.
• Someone brought dinner tonight.
• Someone else said they'd bring dinner the night of surgery.
• The friends I can contact when the excrement hits the oscillating device.

Sigh...

I'd like to thank everyone for the prayers, positive thoughts, encouraging words, and expressed concern for Calypso.  It's been a long week.  After a couple days in the hospital on stronger antibiotics via IV she began to improve and the infection was brought under control.  She is now home and continuing to recover from that. However, the whole episode seems to have reactivated the mono she had at the beginning of the summer.  It has all left her feeling about as vigorous and robust as a piece of wilted lettuce.  Monday is the first day of her senior year...in a building which is under demolition construction.  It is sure to be chaos for everyone in that building.

God bless her, she so badly wants to do well this year and wanted to work hard at a job to earn money to finance her own after school goals.  I've been so proud of how she got her act together in the last half of the previous school year and how much initiative she showed in getting the two jobs she held this summer and in doing them well. I feel awful for her in this whole set back (now that the fear in the lack of answers we were getting earlier in the week has abated).  She's going to need to listen to her body though when she gets tired and let herself heal.  So continued prayers and good thoughts for her as she recovers would still be appreciated.

Last Monday at work I was getting understandably hysterical phone calls from Calypso before we figured out what was going on.  During her hospitalization I got another set of hysterical phone calls from my other two kids.  Just a couple days before Calypso became ill Diana had acquired a hamster...a hamster we shall call Houdini for her amazing ability to escape her cage or her ball...a hamster we would later come to discover was also pregnant.

On the day of the hysterical calls it seems she escaped...to the outdoors.  After realizing the rat Houdini had left the building Diana looked in the cage and discovered 7 babies.  Call #1 was the "What should I do?" call.  I said to put the cage on the patio and hope Houdini heard/smelled/was lured back by her babies.  That worked.  Panicked call #2 was the "What do we do next because the Internet says disturbed hamster mothers get upset and eat their babies?" call.  I have a child in the hospital and I still have some questions about her well being and what comes next for her.  To say I was less than concerned about 7 hamster offspring would be a fair assessment.  Diana was flipping out in the background about the violent deaths these things would face with their mother.  Isaac was tapping away on the computer trying to search out what to do for the mother and babies.  In the distance I could hear what I thought was the pained shrieking of neonate hamsters being eaten.

I suggested they take the whole lot of them back to the pet store and ask for advice.  They did and were advised to hand nurse the hamsters or find another nursing hamster.  This was reported to me during hysterical phone call #3 as Diana continued to panic over the potential for the babies being eaten and how she didn't want to take the bloodthirsty Houdini with her to school.  Having reached the end of my tolerance for these shenanigans I listed the facts for my unglued child.

1. I did not purchase Houdini as a pet, not did I sanction her acquisition.  this was a unilateral decision on Diana's part.
2. I was not assuming any responsibility for said hamster.
3. Diana has been a hunter since age 12 and has reached her hands into the steaming carcass of a large white tail deer buck to eviscerate it after having ended its life.
4. Seven newborn hamsters each roughly the size of my thumbnail seem far less problematic.
5. Did I mention I will have no part of caring for these things?
6. The circle of life/survival of the fittest comes into action here.  Put the babies with their mother and she will either nurse them or eat them, either way the problem is solved.
7. Just in case there is any question, these creatures are your responsibility NOT mine.  They will be returning to school with you.

Diana was less than  happy about the prospect of caring for eight hamsters in a dorm room.  "Yes, my dear, and what have we learned in this experience?"

Yes, between hospitalizations and rapidly multiplying hamsters (and I haven't even mentioned the football practice schedule and Isaac's continuing issues with his knee or various contributions of insanity from Mr. Lime because those are posts all by themselves) it would seem my life is a three ring circus.  I'm just not entirely sure if I am the ring master or merely a bewildered onlooker.

EDIT: (Monday 6:25 am in response to Hilary) The babies have survived thus far.  When my mother came to visit she wanted to see them so I took her into the room where they are being kept.  I dared to make eye contact with the new mother who looked pleadingly at me. Bad idea.  Must not be beguiled by those beady eyes....

Thank God It's Monday

The lack of balance continued through a considerable portion of the weekend. It was enhanced by a schedule which included the following:

Friday night: Baseball game in a distant location for Isaac, Sweet Sixteen party in opposite direction for a friend of Calypso's, Bridal shower for a friend of mine somewhere in between the two.

Saturday: Mr. Lime departing early to work on a deck he is building for a friend. I forgot about this, which led to me not setting my alarm clock, which in turn led to me being jangled into consciousness 15 minutes before Isaac's baseball game that morning. Here's how the call went.

Lime blissfully slumbering between her high thread count tie dyed sheets as she dreams of Hugh Jackman is suddenly rattled when the phone rings. She regards the called ID and notices her son's name. In a state of mild disorientation she wonders if this is him having an emergency or being too lazy to come knock on the door so she answers to hear, "Hello, is Isaac there?" disorientation is magnified considerably as she double checks caller ID during a moment of extreme existential crisis and responds with her froggy, morning voice (Hugh certainly would have it found husky and alluring but the caller seems to react less assuredly), "Uh...no...Isaac?" The caller tentatively inquires, "Michelle?" Since I have been awake for 10 seconds and I am still struggling to determine why my son is calling me to talk to himself and addressing me by my first name confusion increases but I respond affirmatively at which point the caller begins to laugh as he identifies himself as the gentleman who brought Isaac home last night. He further explains that my boy left his phone behind accidentally and since we are clearing up a few matters he was wondering if my son might be intending to join his team for the game which will commence shortly. Suddenly the dawn of understanding cracks with great clarity over my skull and I nearly kill myself trying to get out of bed to accomplish the heroic feat of getting myself dressed and the still sleeping catcher awake, dressed, and deposited behind home plate in time for the first pitch in the next 15 minutes. May I remind the reading public, I am NOT a morning person in even the loosest sense of the word. I'm not a crank, I am just very slow moving. May I also tell you, Isaac moves even slower than I do. The boy fall asleep in his morning shower. It is understood in this house that Isaac's shoes alone require ten full minutes of concentration on his part.

Dear reader, this morning mayhem would prove to be among the most relaxed moments of the day, which went on to involve several other last minute schedule changes (including the employer of one teen letting us know she required the services of said teen but she'd let us know when....we got 15 minutes notice...you'll excuse me if I don't jump for joy and hurry myself to accommodate that) thrown at me from all directions and three teens demanding they all have answers NOW and being taken where they NEEDED to be NOW even though several bits of information were missing that I needed in order to formulate some sort of a workable plan. Demands and tension mounted exponentially until I was given the necessary information, came up with a plan, delivered its details, began to execute it and 3 people decided to shoot it into orbit. I announced, "THIS WAS THE PLAN AND YOU CAN GO WITH IT OR STAY WHERE YOU ARE AND GO NOWHERE!" Then I sat in the car alone and engaged in a bit of primal scream therapy before 2 limelets decided to join the plan and 1 opted out.

Thus one little limelet went to work, one little limelet went to a graduation party, one little limelet stayed home, one mother of limelets cried, "AAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!" all the way there.

Sunday: One part of the schedule was cancelled, mercifully. Another part was reorganized and I had to run the mom taxi 3 times instead of 6.

If you'll all excuse me I think I will go to bed now.

Slice of Lime-Tie Dye Madness

So this weekend I went on a tie dyeing binge. It's been about a year since I broke out the rubber gloves, buckets, squeeze bottles and string. I did 18 t-shirts, 8 dinner napkins, 3 pair of socks, and a partridge in a pear....no, wait, the bird got away. There is one other item I did but won't mention or share at this time because it's a surprise for someone who reads me. Aren't you all wondering now? Ok, so the wash line here only shows a few of the shirts I did but it was kind of nice to see some color splashed against all the white snow.

Though my limelets have rebelled against tie dyes for a number of years now, Calypso has recently seen the light and decided she wants some of her own. Her objection is the bagginess of the t-shirts so she handed over her one form fitting white t-shirt with the request that I make a rainbow swirl on it. Here are the results. She was pleased. Apparently when she wore it around some friends one of them asked her if I would do a short for him too. Maybe the old lady isn't so uncool after all if the youngsters want her stuff.

This next one was an experiment. I get bored doing the same pattern over and over again so I fooled around with different folds to see what I'd get. I liked it! Once the dye is on the garments they have to sit around for 24 hours waiting for all the happy chemical reactions to take place to permanently affix the color to the fabric. I can hardly wait the full time before opening them up to see the results. I know what patterns I am going for. I know what colors I used. But it's still a surprise to see exactly how it all turns out once they are opened up and washed out. Maybe I am weird but it's like Christmas morning when I unwrap all the shirts and other things. I get very excited. If something flops though it's kind of like getting that great big pink bunny suit like in A Christmas Story. Fortunately that doesn't happen to often so it's usually more like getting that Red Ryder BB gun.
Since I am trying to reduce, reuse, and recycle I have been weaning the Lime family off paper napkins and using cloth ones more often. I decided to dye a bunch. They were perfect for using up the small amounts of dye left over after doing the big items. Almost too pretty to wipe your mouth on, huh?

I took bunches of pictures of the finished products but forgot to take any new pictures of me in the tie dyes for this week so here are some of my old favorites in tie dyes I have also done.

Dance of the 7 Dishtowels
Sock it to Me
How'd She Do That?
My Favorite Sheets