I'm kind of surprised it's taken me so long to tell this story here....
I was a voracious reader in elementary school, tearing my way through books like they were all due back at the library the very next day. I'd read A Wrinkle in Time at least eleven times before finishing sixth grade, and I'd gone through every Hardy Boys title I could find. The days when my teachers passed out book orders to the class were like Christmas morning for me. And then somewhere in junior high my interest in reading dried up. You couldn't pay me to read. This became a problem when my ninth grade English teacher told our class we were going to have to do a certain number of book reports every trimester. I was a pretty good student and I enjoyed the teacher so I wanted to succeed in the class, but if that meant reading a book.... Well, let's say I had something of a stubborn streak at age fifteen, and leave it at that.
One day our class was down in the school media center looking for books to check out for our reports. As I was browsing over the shelves looking for something that wouldn't be painful for me to read, it occurred to me that there were literally hundreds, if not thousands, of books in our media center alone, to say nothing of book stores or the public library in town. Was it possible that my English teacher was familiar with every book there was? I didn't see how he could have been. And that was my loophole.
Instead of checking out books and taking the time to read and possibly enjoy them, I thought it'd be a better (easier) idea to just write reports about books that didn't exist. I knew I was taking a chance with this, but I was pretty sure I'd never get called on it if I just made them sound convincing enough. I figured my teacher would read the report and think, "Huh, haven't heard of that one before," and then just move on to the next one in the pile. My mother was a teacher, so I'd seen the repetitive, assembly line nature of grading papers firsthand. The odds had to be in my favor.
I invented authors, titles, main characters, page number counts, assigned them a wide variety of genres to show my diverse interests, wrote plot summaries and concluded them all with some trite statement about what I had learned from the story. I didn't read a single book in ninth grade, but I turned in so many book reports I may have earned some extra credit.
It's hard for me to pinpoint an exact answer if anyone ever asks when I started writing. But I'm pretty sure that part of my brain was alive and kicking by at least ninth grade.
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Wednesday, July 25, 2012
What's Not to Be Happy About?
I screwed everything up. The day was ruined and it was all my fault. At least that’s what it felt like sitting in the hotel room last Saturday night after falling victim to the specter of technical difficulties -- something I am not accustomed to doing.
Let me back up some.... About a week ago I got a message from my cousin asking if I would be willing to record a video of her son’s wedding, which was two days away. She apologized for it being so last minute, but I’ve done a few other wedding videos in the family, including her older son’s, so this wasn’t an unusual request. I told her I’d be happy to, and since I’m not really a fan of weddings (SURPRISE!!) this would give me something to do throughout the day. I recorded somewhere between two and three hours of video, spent the day thinking about a narrative, included candid moments in the crowd, captured the important touchstone events of the day, looked for unique perspectives the bride and groom would appreciate seeing later on. Long story short: Technical glitch. Two and a half hours of video reformatted into nothingness out of nowhere. If it were possible to have a part of my soul break off and wither away, I’m pretty sure it would feel like the moment of realizing the data was truly, irrecoverably gone.
At first I wanted to put my fist through the hotel wall, but that would have only made it easier for me to hear the snoring father and the crying baby next door, which I could already hear more clearly than I needed to. Instead I texted a few of my cousins, mostly looking for someone to commiserate with, but also because I felt I had to own up to this. Yeah, I know, it was a technical thing and it wasn’t my fault, but I try to be reliable for the people in my life so I still felt awful. I hated to think I had promised to take care of something so important to the bride and groom and I was going to let them down.
I met up with my parents in the lobby the following morning, and right away my mother could tell something was bothering me. (For future reference, if my face is expressionless, I’m not making eye contact and I’m only speaking in quiet, short sentences? It’s a good idea to keep your distance.) She empathized with my disappointment and said it would be okay in that way that mothers will say even when it won’t. But she also said something later that stuck with me. When she had been dancing with the groom at one point in the night, she had told him how great it had been to see him smiling all day long, and so happy. To which he replied, “What’s not to be happy about?”
And it clicked for me: Losing the video was a disappointment, but I’d made a much bigger deal out of it than what was necessary. Because whether or not there was a video, he was married to the love of his life, someone who compliments him as well as any one person could compliment another. And their wedding day had been perfect. They’d still have all the memories that came with the day, not to mention what had to be the at least three thousand pictures the photographer took. Losing the last-minute video wasn’t going to change any of that. Not having perfect wouldn’t be enough to keep them from being happy.
Are their lives going to be perfect from here on? Not likely. Nobody gets that. Even though it was a great day, there were some examples of not perfect going on in the lives of the dozens of family members we were all surrounded by that weekend. Some health concerns, palpable losses, professional stress, family stress, people feeling regrets about choices they’ve made or paths they’ve followed. But it was all okay in the moment, because we were together. I know there are a lot of Facebook photo-messages that get posted where people brag about how they have the greatest family or the best cousins or whatever. I’m happy for anyone with a strong family, but... no. You really don’t get it. Nobody has a family like we do. I know how much of a cliché it sounds to say that, but if you had the chance to spend time with all of us in the middle of Farmland, Wisconsin this past weekend and saw how so many levels of aunt / uncle / grandmother / cousin / second cousin / step second cousin / great-grandchildren blend together as just a collection of family, you might start to get it. So the best thing about the weekend for me, even with what felt like an epic failure right in the middle of it, was the chance to be reminded that I am part of something much greater than most people will ever get to experience.
Because of this I was able to put the whole video foul up in perspective: Even if it was sure to be a disappointment, it wasn’t enough to interfere with anyone’s greater happiness.
Let me back up some.... About a week ago I got a message from my cousin asking if I would be willing to record a video of her son’s wedding, which was two days away. She apologized for it being so last minute, but I’ve done a few other wedding videos in the family, including her older son’s, so this wasn’t an unusual request. I told her I’d be happy to, and since I’m not really a fan of weddings (SURPRISE!!) this would give me something to do throughout the day. I recorded somewhere between two and three hours of video, spent the day thinking about a narrative, included candid moments in the crowd, captured the important touchstone events of the day, looked for unique perspectives the bride and groom would appreciate seeing later on. Long story short: Technical glitch. Two and a half hours of video reformatted into nothingness out of nowhere. If it were possible to have a part of my soul break off and wither away, I’m pretty sure it would feel like the moment of realizing the data was truly, irrecoverably gone.
At first I wanted to put my fist through the hotel wall, but that would have only made it easier for me to hear the snoring father and the crying baby next door, which I could already hear more clearly than I needed to. Instead I texted a few of my cousins, mostly looking for someone to commiserate with, but also because I felt I had to own up to this. Yeah, I know, it was a technical thing and it wasn’t my fault, but I try to be reliable for the people in my life so I still felt awful. I hated to think I had promised to take care of something so important to the bride and groom and I was going to let them down.
I met up with my parents in the lobby the following morning, and right away my mother could tell something was bothering me. (For future reference, if my face is expressionless, I’m not making eye contact and I’m only speaking in quiet, short sentences? It’s a good idea to keep your distance.) She empathized with my disappointment and said it would be okay in that way that mothers will say even when it won’t. But she also said something later that stuck with me. When she had been dancing with the groom at one point in the night, she had told him how great it had been to see him smiling all day long, and so happy. To which he replied, “What’s not to be happy about?”
And it clicked for me: Losing the video was a disappointment, but I’d made a much bigger deal out of it than what was necessary. Because whether or not there was a video, he was married to the love of his life, someone who compliments him as well as any one person could compliment another. And their wedding day had been perfect. They’d still have all the memories that came with the day, not to mention what had to be the at least three thousand pictures the photographer took. Losing the last-minute video wasn’t going to change any of that. Not having perfect wouldn’t be enough to keep them from being happy.
Are their lives going to be perfect from here on? Not likely. Nobody gets that. Even though it was a great day, there were some examples of not perfect going on in the lives of the dozens of family members we were all surrounded by that weekend. Some health concerns, palpable losses, professional stress, family stress, people feeling regrets about choices they’ve made or paths they’ve followed. But it was all okay in the moment, because we were together. I know there are a lot of Facebook photo-messages that get posted where people brag about how they have the greatest family or the best cousins or whatever. I’m happy for anyone with a strong family, but... no. You really don’t get it. Nobody has a family like we do. I know how much of a cliché it sounds to say that, but if you had the chance to spend time with all of us in the middle of Farmland, Wisconsin this past weekend and saw how so many levels of aunt / uncle / grandmother / cousin / second cousin / step second cousin / great-grandchildren blend together as just a collection of family, you might start to get it. So the best thing about the weekend for me, even with what felt like an epic failure right in the middle of it, was the chance to be reminded that I am part of something much greater than most people will ever get to experience.
Because of this I was able to put the whole video foul up in perspective: Even if it was sure to be a disappointment, it wasn’t enough to interfere with anyone’s greater happiness.
Friday, July 13, 2012
Big Block of Cheese Day Revisited
Kind of a catch-up day today, hence the title of the post. And if you don't get the reference, I can only strongly encourage you to watch The West Wing. Great show. Anyway, here we go.
* I swear the USB port in the back of my computer reorients itself to the opposite direction every time I need to plug in the cord that syncs my phone and my iPods. There's just no way I can always guess it wrong.
* I just had my house painted over the past two weeks. Before every room in the house was standard construction white, except for one bathroom I sloppily tried to paint years ago and an accent wall in the kitchen that was a particularly arterial shade of red that came that way when I bought the house. Now every room is freshly painted and looking good, and since the whole job wound up costing less than half of what I expected it would? I'm just getting warmed up as far as summer remodeling projects go.
* Cub Foods: Seriously? Who had the idea to get all clever and shuffle the aisles around? I knew where my stuff was. Target did this a couple years back and it took me a long time to get over it. Not cool.
* Since my home life has been overtaken with paint cans and drop cloths lately, I've been putting in some major screen time since there hasn't been much else I can do. I'm one disc away from getting caught up on the first two seasons of "Modern Family," and I'm already several dozen hours' into my second round through the post-apocalyptic world of Fallout 3. Click here if you don't know what I'm talking about. Yeah, I'm a nerd. No surprise there. But if you knew what I had planned for my classes in the coming year, you would not dismiss my nerd powers so quickly.
* Is there a band the world needs less than Maroon 5? I would argue there is not. I'm not saying they're offensively bad, though they certainly aren't great. They're just completely unnecessary.
* Am I the only person who feels relief guilt when a huge storm front lights up the weather radars that interrupt network television programming, and that front misses my house by a matter of miles?
* I was reminded today that my little sister the high school soccer star played left-footed. This was because I'm left-handed (and consequently left-footed) and since she learned the game playing against me in the side yard when we were kids, she mirrored what I did. The things you remember out of nowhere that just knock the wind out of you when they come back... On that note, start watching my Facebook timeline for Relay for Life notices in the next couple of weeks. Go ahead and click on them and donate to my team if you'd like. Because cancer sucks, and being left behind when it takes someone is really not cool. The more money raised, but more baby steps can be taken in the battle.
* Okay, I'm not going to end on a down note. One of the highlights of my week.... The return of "Big Brother" to summer TV! I hate everything about this show and everyone connected to it, and yet I cannot stop watching. When I called Comcast earlier this summer to see how much it would cost for me to add a second cable box in another room (I didn't), I found out that adding Showtime would only cost me another $5 a month. I heard that and thought, "Hey. When Big Brother starts, they always shows live feeds on Showtime 2 late at night. It's summer. I'm up late. Five bucks? SIGN ME UP!!"
I'm not proud of this, but I'm man enough to own this for the weakness it is.
* I swear the USB port in the back of my computer reorients itself to the opposite direction every time I need to plug in the cord that syncs my phone and my iPods. There's just no way I can always guess it wrong.
* I just had my house painted over the past two weeks. Before every room in the house was standard construction white, except for one bathroom I sloppily tried to paint years ago and an accent wall in the kitchen that was a particularly arterial shade of red that came that way when I bought the house. Now every room is freshly painted and looking good, and since the whole job wound up costing less than half of what I expected it would? I'm just getting warmed up as far as summer remodeling projects go.
* Cub Foods: Seriously? Who had the idea to get all clever and shuffle the aisles around? I knew where my stuff was. Target did this a couple years back and it took me a long time to get over it. Not cool.
* Since my home life has been overtaken with paint cans and drop cloths lately, I've been putting in some major screen time since there hasn't been much else I can do. I'm one disc away from getting caught up on the first two seasons of "Modern Family," and I'm already several dozen hours' into my second round through the post-apocalyptic world of Fallout 3. Click here if you don't know what I'm talking about. Yeah, I'm a nerd. No surprise there. But if you knew what I had planned for my classes in the coming year, you would not dismiss my nerd powers so quickly.
* Is there a band the world needs less than Maroon 5? I would argue there is not. I'm not saying they're offensively bad, though they certainly aren't great. They're just completely unnecessary.
* Am I the only person who feels relief guilt when a huge storm front lights up the weather radars that interrupt network television programming, and that front misses my house by a matter of miles?
* I was reminded today that my little sister the high school soccer star played left-footed. This was because I'm left-handed (and consequently left-footed) and since she learned the game playing against me in the side yard when we were kids, she mirrored what I did. The things you remember out of nowhere that just knock the wind out of you when they come back... On that note, start watching my Facebook timeline for Relay for Life notices in the next couple of weeks. Go ahead and click on them and donate to my team if you'd like. Because cancer sucks, and being left behind when it takes someone is really not cool. The more money raised, but more baby steps can be taken in the battle.
* Okay, I'm not going to end on a down note. One of the highlights of my week.... The return of "Big Brother" to summer TV! I hate everything about this show and everyone connected to it, and yet I cannot stop watching. When I called Comcast earlier this summer to see how much it would cost for me to add a second cable box in another room (I didn't), I found out that adding Showtime would only cost me another $5 a month. I heard that and thought, "Hey. When Big Brother starts, they always shows live feeds on Showtime 2 late at night. It's summer. I'm up late. Five bucks? SIGN ME UP!!"
I'm not proud of this, but I'm man enough to own this for the weakness it is.
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