Oddity, Week One

Fear

My dog Sebastian has a phobia. Even though I'm afraid of heights and have an unnatural fear of spiders, it never occurred to me that animals have phobias, too. Sebastian, a 15-pound shih tzu, has a few quirks that I find amusing. For one, he spontaneously sprawls out like a bear rug on the floor while walking across a room. Suddenly, I'm assuming, he needs a rest.

At first I thought his refusal to climb up or down the stairs was cute. He just wants me to carry him, I thought. Eventually, though, I put the pieces together. He, too, is terrified of heights. The three sharp intakes of breath as we descend the fourteen steps to the main floor remind me of the time I hyperventilated on the stairs of the rock tower at Mt. Cheaha, my mom swearing that it would be less painful for her to jump than to endure the unbearable fear of falling. I wonder if fear is hereditary.

I can't say Sebastian's phobia isn't convenient sometimes. We can let him out on the porch without fear of him running off and getting lost. There are ten stairs between him and freedom.

If we're late coming downstairs in the mornings, Sebastian braves the climb up in an attempt to be closer to his family. At first, he only made it as far as the landing. Now, on a good day, he makes it as far as two steps from the top. Those last two 6-inch obstacles are more than he can bear.

Improv, Week One

"The Pain Scale" ~Eula Biss

Relevant passage:

"Hospice nurses are trained to identify five types of pain: physical, emotional, spiritual, social, and financial.
The pain of feeling, the pain of caring, the pain of doubting, the pain of parting, the pain of paying" (30).

An itch is a kind of pain, according to Eula Biss' father. Being uncomfortable also, according to me. The pair keeps me awake at night. If there are indeed five types of pain--and I think there are at least five--then I propose that the emotional, spiritual, social, and financial types manifest themselves in the physical.

My first encounter with the Wong-Baker pain scale was a comedic one, likely because I wasn't in pain. Michael, my oldest son, also not in pain, attributed the pain-free face to my husband Jeff's face when he takes the family to McDonald's. The contorted "worst pain imaginable face," Michael asserted, represents Jeff's pain level when we eat at Applebee's. Proof, I suggest, that the pain scale is relative. After paying at Sea Captain's House in Myrtle Beach or the quaint Cajun cafe on the corner of Bourbon Street in New Orleans, Applebee's might register a '5' or a '6.' Financial pain--the pain of paying. I didn't feel it personally.

Sometimes, though, I do feel other people's pain. Emotional pain--the pain of caring. When my mom was suffering from emotional abuse and refused to be helped or help herself, my chest hurt all the time. Every night, I rolled up a pillow to press against my heart, trying to hold my body together. To stop the constant sensation of exploding. Helplessness. The worst pain imaginable?

Sometimes, doctors say, we live with pain so long that it seems normal. This kind of pain, we don't acknowledge. Tyler, my best friend Patricia's oldest child, was diagnosed with severe allergies at the age of 13. He also needed sinus surgery. Patricia questioned the diagnosis, noting that Tyler never complained of feeling badly. His doctor said he had probably adjusted to the pain. He'd felt that way so long that he didn't know he felt badly. This, for Patricia, induced guilt. Another kind of emotional pain.

Reportage, Week One

(Just a quick disclaimer: I found the "reportage" entry to be the most difficult post so far. What can be left out? What can't? I noticed lots of things, and I'm pretty sure this gets especially boring. I cut a couple hundred words. And still . . .)

Annual Appearance

Once a year, my family shovels out five dollars apiece to watch Woodland face off against Wedowee in basketball. The rivalry is decades old, my husband's alma mater the former, mine the latter. That's not why we go, though. We go to watch the sons and daughters of friends and family, just like they come to dance recitals and concerts to watch mine.

Friday night, we take our seats midway up the bleachers on the visitor's side, near the exit, in Wedowee's new gym. I had forgotten about the latest mud tossing—the insistence that Woodland's fans have no class. They don't. I'm no fan, so I can say that.

Jeff and I spread out on the bleacher, taking up more room than we need, expecting lots of visits from children from both sides. One of the benefits of my twelve years in the daycare business. We have a large extended family.

Across the gym on the home side, the JV girls' from both teams get their pre-game pep talks. Carley (a former daycare baby) plays JV. Her siblings—Callen age six and McKenzie age nine—are sitting between Jeff and me. She'll come speak to us after the game. Seventh grade changes things.

On both sides, fans wear election shirts, spatterings of the Woodland crew sporting “Re-elect Paul Gay, Superintendent of Education,” while about as many of Wedowee's fans don “Vote for Change, Elect Rance Kirby.” Campaign cards are dealt.

Levi, my best friend's middle child, comes to chat before his game. After punching Jeff on the shoulder, he talks to me about his mom. “She's not coming tonight. Caylin has a gymnastics meet. That stuff is all the time.”

Woodland's JV girls take a fairly easy win, holding Wedowee to 15 points to their own 38. At halftime, McKenzie had predicted 38 to 16. She grins as Jeff tells everybody. He's impressed. So am I.

Wedowee's JV boys answer back, beating their rivals by a cool 19. While the varsity-B boys play, the crowd thickens, boys without shirts making their way to Wedowee's top right bleacher. One passes by on our side sporting a large blue “G” on his pale, hairless chest, his belly a little like jello. Girls in halter tops join the bare-chested, and I note their painted bodies shifting around to send our fans a message. “RCHS IGERS!!!”

Jeff wonders out loud, “Where's the 'T?'”

There's a girl in a white shirt standing between the “S” and “I.” “Maybe she has a 'T' sign,” I offer. But then the “T” guy shows up, and I realize the white shirt girl is the space.

When the varsity girls come out to play, the crowd gets animated, empty coke bottles thumping against legs, feet tapping against metal bleachers, fans identifying the players they know. Grandmas, aunts, uncles, moms, dads giving in to habits, biting nails, chewing bottom lips, readjusting hats. Rap music booms from the loud speaker while fans and cheerleaders form a human tunnel, dramatizing the girls' entrance.

Wedowee won't put up double digits. Both teams know it. Leading Woodland's lineup are the Strain girls—Leah, Shanna, Shalyn, and Amy. Coach Strain had these girls playing together from the time they could dribble—his daughter Leah, her twin cousins, and a cousin from another brother. Leah, a sophomore, is already being courted by Alabama, Florida, and Tennessee, her older sister Courtney on full athletic scholarship at Auburn. Jade Walker is the fifth starter.

A thinned-down version of Wedowee's marching band plays, “All I do is win, win, win, no matter what. Got money on my mind and I can never get enough. Cuz every time I step up in the building, everybody's hands go up.” I know this because my daughter Emily, behind me, sings along.

After the whistle, the girls' shoes squeak incessantly, like baby birds in a nest, impatient for their food. Jade's dad yells, “You're out there by yourself baby. You gotta shoot!” A reference to the Strain team.

Wedowee's white-jerseyed girls can't take a shot, the girls in orange dispensing with the typical one on one blocks, all going after the ball. Frustrated, the girls in white look more like spectators as orange blur after orange blur demonstrate layups. They don't miss. Three's. Two's. Foul shots. Swoosh. At halftime, the score is 44 to 4. The final, 79 to 9. McKenzie had predicted 80 to 10.

The varsity boys enter through their respective human spirit lines. “All we do is win, win, win.” The painted bodies start their chanting, “We, Wedowee, we we Wedowee.” The final game.

Wedowee rallies, driving up a 10-point lead. The Woodland boys step up, closing the gap to one, just as the halftime buzzer sounds. After the whistle, Woodland's Ricky Stevens, still mobile from chasing the ball, slices through the sandwiched fans on the guest side bleachers, a slave to his unchecked momentum.

In the second half, Woodland stays slightly behind, keeping their own Coach Jones animated and on his feet. He's tall and thin with a slight stoop. His mouth stays open, but his words get absorbed before they get to me. Except for the oft repeated, “You hear me? You hear me?” That part I get. He never turns his back on the court, following the ball like an orangutan running sideways. “You hear me?”

During a timeout, a Wedowee player chats with a ref. Behind me, a disgruntled fan shouts, “Stop talking to the ref! Hey! Number 14! Stop talking to the ref!”

At the final buzzer, Wedowee gets the win, 59-52. Shots of the scoreboard get uploaded instantly to Facebook. Noone posts the girls' score.

Peer Response, Week One

Response to MacKenzie's "Reportage" Entry, Week One

I'm a rookie writer, so I find it difficult to offer helpful commentary. But I'll give it my best shot. Across the board, your bits of dialogue are timely, breaking up exposition and giving your subjects a realistic humanity. Sometimes, when you're giving us inner dialogue, I think it would give your prose more of a punch if you let the visual speak for you. For example, when you say that Daniel demolished the cheese dip, it distracts a little from the familiar image of "the last bits of it [congealed] in the bottom of the bowl." Maybe there's a way to show us who the culprit is without that front bit of introduction. I have a pretty cool visual of the guy with the "metabolism of a frightened antelope." I know the type. Nice image. To me, the last two paragraphs are your strongest. The only other observation I have is that your introductory sentence seems to get a little bogged down. Perhaps simply opening with "Apparently the new thing is just meat on a tortilla," might strengthen your hook.

Free Writing, Week One

*response to classroom prompt--moment when you felt awkward for your parent(s)

Errata

In fourth grade--a few months after donning a bright blue cast on my left leg that made me look cool, but before the chicken pox ordeal of spring--my dad walked into my math class to bring me roses on Valentine's Day. It was the handwritten card that made me blush for him. My dad signed his name to report cards--to everything--in print. EmmetT WhiTE--a cross between bell hooks' unconventional John Hancock and a first grader's. On notes to school, permission slips, and cards attached to Valentine vases, caps cropped up mid-word or at the fronts of words like At or LatE. Or LoVe.

Those rogue caps seemed magnified, making a spectacle, in my eyes, of my dad's unrecognized flaw, making him somehow vulnerable. There were things he should know, but didn't. That's what pricked me most. That's why I folded that card up like a paper fan and stuffed it in the back pocket of my Levi 505's.

People notice big things, making them spectacles because they're big. Think of Bigfoot, monster trucks, the fattest woman on earth, or General Sherman, the 3,000-year-old redwood in California's Sequoia National Forest thought to be the "largest--and oldest-- living thing on the face of the earth" (Burnam). But the large "V" squeezed between the "o" and "e" represents a different phenomenon altogether. Like my dad in a room filled with grammar school boys, the mid-sentence caps are out of place, mutinous, defiant, disturbing. Suggesting chinks in the painstaking onslaught of grammar drilled into our psyches from the time we can read "See Spot run."

The grade-school mantra "We have rules for a reason" brings to memory the perils of casually discarded gum, fights in the hall, or running with scissors. But the alphabet never hurt anybody. For the guardians of grammar, distinctions separate the dangerous from the rebellious, pitting the hard-nosed headmistress with a pointer, horn-rimmed glasses, and a scowl against the quaint protests of a young man, all grown up, finally beyond her reach. Playing with her rules.

Driving too fast, beaming baseballs at base runners, or choosing on a whim which side of the road to drive on can get you killed. An omitted comma might put you under suspicion. But THe rules goVerning caps only threaten to give or withhold reverence to nouns like the united states, Bumper Cars, or oliver twist. Maybe my dad didn't know better. Or maybe he didn't care.

No matter. I don't think my classmates were playing grammar police that day, anyway. As soon as my dad closed the door on my math class, Sherry Wier grabbed the sleeve of my Member's Only windbreaker to whisper breathlessly, "That's your dad? He so fine!"

Original Prompt, Week One

Source Essay: “Getting Along With Nature” by Wendell Berry

Strategy Notes:

Although Berry's writing is heavy on the exposition and relatively lean on imagery, he uses enough rich instances of the latter to balance the essay and avoid an overly sermonistic presentation. The essay makes a case for communion with nature without painting a nasty picture of culture, although it includes pros and cons of both in specific contexts.

One strategy I see using for myself is that of investing ample research time before attempting to narrate something I care deeply about. It's not enough to want to advocate something, to write about something important. Berry's essay highlights the necessity of intimately knowing multiple angles of an issue if you want to a) take a reasonable position, and b) potentially convince your audience that some change is desirable.

Berry writes, “I knew a barber once who refused to give a discount to a bald client, explaining that his artistry consisted not in the cutting off, but in the knowing when to stop” (24). He seems to be speaking here to the art of writing, as well as to the advantages of restraint in general. Along these lines, Berry uses his prose in this essay to contradict the idea that arguing for change from an absolutist position is effective or advantageous. In fact, he posits that for the arguments posed by the staunch defenders of nature and of culture, “It is a dangerous mistake . . . for either side to pursue [the] quarrel on the assumption that victory would be a desirable result” (20). (For example, saving all the sheep by eradicating all the coyotes vs. protecting sheep predators to the degree that farmers lose their rights to protect their livestock.)

Prompt:

Your first visit to a zoo or to a campus habitat for a live college mascot (eg Baylor's bears or UNA's lions).

Junkyard Quote Four, Week One

"Well, I'm half vegetarian." ~~Sara, age 6

Junkyard Quote Three, Week One

"Superheroes always call people citizens." From the mouths of babes . . . (after being asked to explain what "citizen" meant).

Junkyard Quote Two, Week One

"When I was maybe ten years old, my dad welded together something like a fireplace insert and installed it in the middle of our living room floor. The temperature hovered around the 80s in the common room after that, but the bedrooms were icy. Until, that is, a neighbor tore down chicken houses and gave my dad a few of those monster fans from the ends. He placed those fans in our bedrooms and used them to pull in heat from the insert. Our rooms were warm then. But I think I have some hearing loss from the noise." ~~Denise (sister-in-law) (I did paraphrase.)

Junkyard Quote One, Week One

AOL headline: "Braille Burgers From Fast Food Chain Wimpy Let Blind People 'See' Food"

To advertise that all its locations "feature menus in Braille for the benefit of the visually impaired," the South African fast food chain Wimpy "decided to launch a viral marketing campaign that would appeal to blind people." Apparently, the campaign consisted of distributing fifteen hamburgers in Braille-adorned buns (yes, the chefs manipulated the dough to inscribe the message) to fifteen blind people, filming their reactions, and making it into a commercial.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/12/braille-burgers-wimpy_n_1201622.html?ref=food

I chose this . . . a) because it is surprising and b) because it seems a bit exploitative.

Memory, Week One

My Last Steak

Dinner out meant steak or seafood. I chose steak. A ribeye, I'm fairly sure. I can't say that slab of well-done meat looked pretty on my plate. A charred measure of brown and black against the backdrop of overcooked broccoli and a microwaved potato. The smell, though, like fried butter, evoked backyard parties. Communion. Family night. Sometimes still, the scent wafts into memory, taking me back to a time when steak meant steak, not cow. I miss that.

And the taste? Something like sweet smoke, but with substance. A little chewy, but no blood. A tradeoff. Slicing away my third, maybe fourth bite, a thin string recoiled like a friendly snake caught by surprise. I put my fork and knife to work, attempting to bypass the offending reminder of life. A fruitless attempt.

Jeff, a little distracted by my shift from eating to disecting, offered comfort. “It's probably just a vein. You know, a blood vessel. Or a tendon. Just eat around it.”

A vein. A tendon. He said that out loud. I placed my fork, still warm from its foray into cow flesh, in a discarded napkin. I asked the waitress for a clean one and finished off my potato in silence.