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– Pink slipped, again

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"Model in a Pink Slip," Jules Pascin

"Model in a Pink Slip," Jules Pascin

Last week I had a meeting with my boss, and I learned that my job in the writing program at MIT is ending with this semester. Others in the program, too, have lost their jobs or had their hours reduced.

Three years ago, a little later in the spring, I heard similar news from my boss at Simmons College, where I then worked and taught.

Here’s a reflection on how I felt then and how I feel now. And let me preview the conclusion: Yes, one gets wiser — and more determined — with experience. Continue reading →

– Hail to the, er, crochet

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obamacrochetI’ve been wanting to put a photo of President Obama on my blog. However, I do have some editorial policies (admittedly, my own) that I follow, and his photographic image doesn’t really fit. He’s not very Leaf: not a gardener, is he? I suppose I could say he’s kinda Word; I mean, he’s a great rhetoritician. But, still, I don’t think I have anything original to say about Obama as a speaker that hasn’t already been said.  At last, however, he and his image — this crocheted image — fits Stitch.

And, yes, I could make this. But I won’t.

*

*

Portrait in crochet by Todd Paschall. Link via whipup.

– Day one: salute

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Walnut Hill Cemetery, January 2008.

Walnut Hill Cemetery, January 2008.

These flags, marking the plain graves of veterans in our local cemetery, seem to me to be like the first bulbs of spring, in a way, pushing through as winter hangs on. They remind us to persevere, and look ahead.

I know, I know, my metaphor does not work perfectly, and yet no metaphor does. Still, today I feel the pricklings of hope, as well as the determination of a New England gardener, to roll up my sleeves and make what I can of a new season. What we sow, we sow on old, ancient, and even dead ground, but, still, what grows there can be glorious.

Last night at dinner, the five of us, who watched the Inauguration in five separate locations, talked first about our reactions to the ceremony itself.  And then the talk moved, remarkably, to what we should work on, from the long list of pressing national tasks that clamor for doing.

That Obama’s ethos of work and service reached Jimmy and me, two adults with liberal and even leftist leanings, is no surprise. However, that his message has reached three children, too, is a sign of its power and his tenacity.

I got my shovel out. Gloves are on. Feeling strong. Ready.

– Weather whipsaw

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Winter easing its grip on Northeast – The Boston Globe

Analyzing four decades of winter climate data, beginning in 1965, University of New Hampshire scientists found that regional temperatures are rising at a rate of 0.8 degrees per decade. Meanwhile, the number of days with snow on the ground is decreasing at the rate of 3.6 days per decade, the study found.

Jane and snow, Leicester, MA. 1975.

Jane and snow, Leicester, MA. 1975.

This explains why, a few years ago, I never got my backyard ice rink to freeze, and why there is no longer that profuse snow I recall from childhood, when it seemed possible, every winter, to help my father build a roomy igloo in the piles of snow left by the plows and then play in that igloo for days and days.

UPDATE (Dec 22): Although one or two storms do not a trend make, we are suddenly BLANKETED by snow here in Boston, after a snowfall on Friday the 19th and another on Sunday the 21st. And yesterday Harrison was out there with the girls, digging a fort into the piles left by the plows.

– Fight, might, win*

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On Saturday afternoon, emerging from the cramped hell of the Government Center MBTA stop into spacious City Hall plaza, I was greeted by a leafletter and activist. He caught me off guard.

Activist: I’m with the American Communist party.  Are you here for the demonstration?

Jane: (silently double-takes at “communist”) Er, yeah.

Activist: We believe that the Prop 8 marriage ban is one of a number of equal rights atrocities in this country.  There are workers’ rights, health care rights–

Jane: (warming up to and interrupting him) I’m with you.

By the way, he looks like a young Jackson Browne. Remember him?

Activist: Are you here because… (long sizing-up pause) of reproductive rights?

Jane: (what? huh?) Well, I’m for reproductive rights — yes, definitely — but I’m here to oppose the ban on gay marriage.

Activist: Great.  Are you willing to make a donation? Here’s our newspaper.

Jane: (hands over five dollars) Yes.

Activist: Thanks. So, basically we believe more and more people must become combative on these issues of rights. We need to step it up, put more pressure on the system.

Jane: (alarmed) Oh, well, I’m basically against violence, so —

Activist: I’m nonviolent, too. I don’t meant violence. I mean we have to organize and fight.

Jane: Okay, yes.

Since Saturday, I’ve been ruminating over that conversation, and the subtle yet important differences between violent and combative.  He’s right. And although I went to the demonstration and was counted, is it enough to stand there peacefully on the sidelines, as I did? Silence, after all, does not speak volumes.

—-

*Regarding my choice of title for this post: One year in high school I was a cheerleader for the basketball team.  Kind of a social experiment that didn’t take.  Anyway, one of our cheers went like this: “We’re gonna F-I-G-H-T; we’re gonna M-I-G-H-T; we’re gonna W-I-N. [pause] We’re gonna fight with all our might to win!”  And while I do NOT equate protesting with mere cheerleading, the word “fight” always fires this connection in my memory.

– Oh, shit

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Patriotic party beads

Patriotic party beads

This morning, before our 8am departure time for work, we were running around and picking up the house in advance of the housecleaners’ arrival. On the kitchen counter, I found the detritus (in photo) from last week’s Election Eve party at my sister Sally’s house. It hasn’t taken long for my mood to sober up since that day, and the jubilant day after, because the country is, to quote the lyrics of one of my favorite Talking Heads songs, “Same as it ever was.”

And how is almost-President Obama feeling? I pictured him waking up on Thursday, the day after the day after, turning to Michelle and saying, “Oh, shit.”

There is a lot to do.

—-

iPhone image of beads credited to local cameraperson Jimmy Guterman. That is, however, my hand.

– I’m eighteen again.

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I recall that, when I was about 12, a family friend, Paula Z., asked me what age I was looking forward to. “Eighteen,” I said. Paula’s eyebrows seemed to raise a bit in surprise. I wondered, then and now, if she was expecting another answer.

“Why eighteen?” she asked.

Because, by 18, I reasoned, I would be able to both drive and vote. In my child’s view, both of those signified adulthood, vehicles for participating in the wider world: of work, and of citizenship.

I recall, too, driving myself to the tiny Town Clerk’s office when I turned 18 and proudly filling out my voter registration card. I don’t think I’ve missed an election since; when I was in college, I dutifully got my absentee ballots and voted in the college’s post office, for some reason.

And talk about dutiful: over the years, the act of voting, but for a blip in ’92, has often felt like an obligation to me, something you do because you have to. I kept doing it, more out of habit than pleasure.

Today, though, I feel as forward-looking and civic-minded as I did at 12, or at 18, and enlarged in spirit by my participation in democracy’s central act. I’m tired, but happy pop songs are playing in my head, and I’m energized and giddy too. The adult me and child me, in one.

And now, Mr. Obama, bring on the work. I suppose it’s time to turn the feeling into action.

– Presidential dress code

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Grace watched me get dressed.  It was a skirt day, and I was yanking on some tights.

“I don’t understand why people like tights,” she said. “Uncomfortable.”

“They’re okay.” I shrugged.

Her face was scrunched with doubt.

“I could never be president,” Grace declared, almost as if someone had just that moment asked her to seek her party’s nomination.

“Uh, sure you could.”

“No, I couldn’t.  Because I hate tights.”

I gave her my best what-are-you-talking-about look.

“And women presidents have to wear skirts,” she retorted.

I protested.  “You could wear pants!”

Grace, only eight years old, had the last word: “No, only skirts.”

(Ah, the power of the image, and unwritten rules.)

—-

P.S.  Go, Obama! You have my vote. Still, I miss you, Hillary. You would have worn pants, as Ms. President. I’m sure of it.