2 Board Alley

VRS: It's From the Onion, so I Know it's True

Garden Coaching: Just What I Need

Just in time for this year's foray into the vegetable garden:  a gardening coach who will come to my house and , more importantly, to my vegetable garden, and show me how to maintain and sustain an eco- (but not deer-)friendly cabbage patch. 

It's exactly what I need--I've got the books, the tools and the space, but what I lack is the knowledge and confidence to pull it off without pulling out the wrong plant (as in, what's a weed?)

I want to build a strong wire canopy top for the garden to keep the deer from leaping over the ten-foot tall fence, which they do well and frequently.  I am going to revive the radio that plays NPR (or any channel, for that matter) and frightens the deer, and I just might create a deer garden on the other side of the yard to keep their focus away from my food.  Something tells me that that wouldn't be such a great a idea, and that I should just let them chomp across the lawn. 

And I want to keep the butterfly garden trimmed and weeded, but I don't think I'll do much with it this year--I want to get the vegetable garden growing and the compost heaps brewing. 

The "Boy in Petticoat" Speaks

I've noticed that there have been a lot of searches for "boy in petticoat," which have landed here, at 2BA, due to this photo of me, a girl, in a dress:

I don't know if it's the haircut, the broad shoulders or the bruised knees that make this picture seem masculine, but I find it curious that I'm being interpreted as a boy.  What marks "masculine" and "feminine" in this photo?  And what feature, perceived as masculine, overrides the rest, and determines that this is a photo of a boy? And why does it matter?

Coming fresh off of a semester of teaching feminist literary criticism, I've been wondering why it is at all important to know what another person's gender is.  Why does it matter in the everyday transactions of life? Is there a psychological comfort in being able to put people into discernible categories? And when does sorting become stereotype, become prejudice, become hatred?

So, to have these thoughts wandering through my head at the same time that I've become the "boy in petticoat," has been a moment of synchronicity for me. In terms of this photo, I've thought it amusing, largely because I know that I'm not a boy, and that I'm wearing a dress, not a petticoat.  The word "petticoat" seems old, and makes me feel like an artifact--like I (or the I in this photo) belong in a painting from the 1700's. 

The perception is also a judgment made at a distance--I have no idea who started this search, so while on the one hand, it may seem creepy, on the other hand, it seems like something that I have the choice of dismissing, discussing or confronting, as though it were a theoretical argument and not a determiner of my well-being.

Interesting, interesting, interesting.

ETA:  So I did my own google search and found out that dressing boys as girls is a means of punishing them, and that it is considered a form of erotica-pedophilia.  Charming.  I'm taking the photo down now. 

2009:The Year in Anticipation--It's a Meme if You Choose

Instead of reviewing the year, I think I'll push ahead optimistically and write the title of the first post of each month for the coming year.  You, good reader, can feel so tagged, or not, to imitate this gambit in the memes of life.

January:  What Would it Cost to Rent My House For the Inauguration?

February:  I'm a Dancing Machine

March:  Setting the Trend:  Unmatched Socks

April:  Trying to ignore the obvious poetic references to the month

May:  Pollin-Nation

June:  Fifty-Two, And Growing Lovelier With Each Day

July:  Something Thoughtful About a Book or An Article

August:  An Observation About Life Made While Sitting on the Hammock

September:  Five Teaching Goals

October:  FCB: A Retrospective

November:  Rethinking Those Five Teaching Goals

December:  2009 Rewind

My Father, the Soldier

Here's a photo of my father sent to me today by my cousin.  I have very few pictures of my father from his youth that it was a delight to get this one. 

I've Got Cat Class and I've Got Cat Style: FCB Visits YouTube

This Sunday

I'm still playing cat and mouse with this cold thang.  I've got a mountain or two of papers to grade and an evaluation to finish for tomorrow, and I'll I've done so far is snooze. 

Much of yesterday was taken up with shopping and spoiling a niece in town for a gymnastics meet.  We had great fun picking out things for a wreath at the craft store, and I felt like a very proper Martha Stewart hot gluing things to styrofoam and tulle.

One wreath was crafted out of baubles from the store, the other, from Christmas tree ornaments that I never use since I never have a tree.  I took an old embroidery hoop that I never use and covered it in tulle, and then hot glued the ornaments to it.  I found a long chain of red beads--maybe a floral arrangement leftover?-and glued it around the edge.  The wreath looks great, and I have Clancy to thank for the idea.

Slept The Day Away: RBOC

Thus far, the cold I've been flirting with has been kept at arm's reach.

Adrienne Rich will have to wait until tomorrow night.

My husband has been released from the doghouse. 

Snickerdoodle is trying to pry open the china closet, which is neither full of china or a closet, but is relatively unstable, so I'd best go deal with it. And him.

I've lost my ability to suffer fools gladly. 

In Maryland, we have snow that tends to melt very quickly, so I'm coining a new word, "Snelt."  As in, "By noon, it had snelted, and people were out on the roads."

Rage

I'm so wiped out right now that I can't think clearly.  I have a mountain and a half of papers to grade, and several pieces of writing to get to before class on Tuesday night.  Let's not even go into the fact that my father died a month ago and I am still feeling like shit most of the time.  Or that I needed to get through my daily ration of thank- you cards.

My husband planned a party for the army-navy game.  I thought it was supposed to last only for the length of the game.  The first guest arrived at 11:30 a.m.  The last guest left at 9:15.  I don't recall anyone saying anything remotely like a condolence about my father.  Oh, well, I just pay the mortgage here.

At five, when I hoped the guests would go, go, go home, they just got louder.  So I'm sitting in my bedroom, with the cats hiding under the bed, trying to read Adrienne Rich and feeling increasingly more shitty.  I don't mean angry, I just mean shitty.  Like a band was playing in between my ears. 

Our basement rec room is right under the bedroom, and thanks to the wonderful, open layout of the house, there is no escaping the din of people arguing politics and god knows what else in the basement.  And then a few stepped outside under the bedroom window and loudly carried on about the state of the world.

I took a tranquilizer and  figured that they'd be out by seven, tops. 

I figured wrong.  

Finally, I politely called down to my husband and and told him to get them out.  He admitted to not being very good at getting people to leave, and I suggested that he learn how to and fast. 

I'm too old to be appalled by their insensitivity, but I am tired, angry and have a headache.  I also have to get to the aforementioned work by Monday. 

And I have nothing more to say or write now.

RBOC

Thanksgiving Break is almost over, and I give thanks for having the time to:

• Grieve.  To throw myself into the process without worrying about my responsibilities to the rest of the world;
• Grade.  I am making progress through the mountain of ungraded papers.  Not as much as I would have liked, but considering the above, I am making progress.
• Launder.  Oh, the laundry piles surpass  the paper stacks around here.
• Heal.  Well, avoid coming down with a head cold that has been flirting with me for over a week now.