Yesterday, I read Susan Minot's Rapture, a book about what two people in an on again-off again relationship are thinking while engaged in a sexual act. Some people think it's depressing, because the couple is clearly not in love, nor in a healthy relationship. I think it's really well-written and true to life. Here are some excerpts:

"You couldn't be sure which way it would go, the first time you touched someone. Either the person would be familiar and the way he held you would sort of take your breath away, or he would remain a stranger and though your breathing would be affected, the way he held you would be odd and unknown, like arriving in a foreign country and being hit with its smells, which are intoxicating but about which you remain uncertain. It was not the all-consuming feeling which comes when you arrive at a place you've known well, after being away a long time, so that some things are changed, giving you a new thrill, and since you see it with new eyes, it is both old and new, both familiar and strange."

"Sometimes you got that feeling when you met someone - the horizon widened. Most of the time, after you got to know the person, the widening feeling went away. You got used to the person's vista. But with Kay the feeling had lasted. In his better moments he could believe that with her, he might become the person he wanted to be."

"He didn't understand women. He'd only grown accustomed to expecting certain types of inexplicable behavior. For instance, if you told a woman she looked beautiful it immediately cheered her up, no matter how much she was ragging on you or how pissed off she might be... Or, he'd observed, women spent long periods of time exchanging obscure information with each other which, if you listened to what they were saying, you could not figure out the important part."

"She left with his Great to see you ringing in her ears. She walked away, rattled. She felt as if God were watching her and testing her - not that she actually believed in God, it was more like a concerned third party - overseeing what was going on between her and Benjamin, watchful of her progress. She didn't know exactly what she was expected to do, or what the test was, but instinct told her that walking away from him on her own was the beginning of passing it."

"It gave a person a chill thinking about it, how much things could change between people. It only confirmed her impression that the bottom was constantly dropping out of human relations."

"But powerful things usually contain complications and with complications come trouble, trouble of the sort people spend their whole lives avoiding, or, if they were like Kay and most of the human race, looking for."

"Not that she knew precisely what she needed, but she knew what she was drawn to, and those things were not always in her practical best interest. They were the things which made her feel... Love, as far as she could see, had little to do with reason and practicality, unless you were lucky and happened to be built that way."

"No matter how grounded you were in the present, your body could sent you into the past. Even if all feeling was gone and the person no longer held the tiniest glimmer of fascination, your body could still react and you'd feel it, like the vibration of an old land mine, long forgotten, being tripped and exploding miles away."

"Knowing more of life made your feelings more dense. Those feelings had survived life's onslaught. The more jaded and protective and disillusioned you became with age, the bigger love would have to be to generate life out of those ruins."

Adventures in Signage, Pt. 6

I like to imagine the artist vacillating about the decision to draw poo coming out of the dog's butt. "Should I just paint dots? A stream? An unmistakable wafer of waste? Should it be black, too, or should I differentiate the poo using brown paint?"


You know what the biggest problem facing the world today is?
That's right - human/bird conflicts.


Just drop your awkward teenage daughter off here. Pick her up in about eleven years.


A shout out to my homies.


A shout out to my homes.

When Garden of Eden, my local chain gourmet market, sold cartons of raspberries for $1.25 a few weeks ago, I thought I'd died and gone to a sixties commune. The fact that I rushed to the sale on a break during work, generating enough sweat to glisten Bob Dylan's entire fan base, confirmed my thinking. Ditto for the sweet, stomach gurgling tripping after eating four cartons consecutively.

"You're paranoid, alright." Cade would have diagnosed. "Paranoid about poopin' yer pants!" He likes to tease me about that sort of thing, because I'm the very picture of what Freud envisioned when he coined the term "anal retentive."

Fortuitously, the aforementioned gross boyfriend found out that both his mom and the first crop of raspberries would be in New Hope last weekend. This was enough to get me to Penn Station, where my feet were stepped on and I was stuck sharing a seat with a mouth breathing gal headed for Newark. I hate Penn Station.

Upon arrival, Paul picked Cade and me up for a celebration at one of the myriad lame bars in suburban Pennsylvania. It was time for one of my least favorite things in the world - Hanging Out With People I Don't Know In A Place So Loud I Can't Get To Know Them.

Maybe it's just me. There's a reason I could never meet someone in a bar, besides my dad's assertion that relationships initiated in bars end in toxic breakups, if not disembowelments or restraining orders. Oh, and the fact that I'm legendarily mean to guys: "Not so fast! You're going to have to buy me a drink if you want to talk to me." The reason I cannot make fast friends at bars, no matter how much "social lubricant" is doused on the situation, is that I'm terribly hard of hearing. Not to the point where I gruffly correct people, "Speak up when you're talking to me!" which is how my dad addresses the problem. That's why he doesn't like bars and crowded restaurants.

So I can't read lips, and I'm horrible about doing the Magic 8 Ball trick of adding, "Wow. Yeah... Really?" to lulls in the conversation. Luckily, Cade and Alex stuck by my side and talked to me. I could hear them and they weren't saying anything too remarkable, but not too banal, either. I don't like small talk unless it's somehow spun in a delightfully mean-spirited or shocking direction. That doesn't happen too often.

Cade owed me. I stood for hours, enduring the pain of having to explain the ingredients of my favorite cocktail to a bartender, sipping an alcoholic Kool-Aid drink, and meeting someone who I'm sure is very nice and who has known Cade for years. She was nice and talking to me. I couldn't hear her, so I played non-native English speaker and nodded a lot. It's frustrating when that happens in America. At the end of the night, I rode in the backseat with Alex and his girlfriend. They were lasciviously sharing a meatball hoagie. Literally. The smell was sickening, not to mention the innuendo.

The next day, Cade kept his promise. He drove me to Solebury Orchards in his dad's tiny Mini Cooper. It is not the newer model, which looks spacious compared to the classic. Not even the typical implements look familiar. While Cade drove, I kept asking what this odd handle or that strange knob did, inching closer.

"No!" Cade swatted my hands away. "Don't touch! I'm not sure what that one does. You and I clearly have very different approaches to driving."

Well, yeah. My approach is not to. But even if I wanted to drive, my approach would be to know how to operate everything before I started cruising at dizzying speeds.

"Today is not the day, Cade," I said en route.

He was confused. "You don't want to pick raspberries?"

"No, I don't want to die in a fiery car crash. Maybe tomorrow?"

He rolled his eyes, his 6'1" tall self folded into the driver's seat. I relaxed. We looked like some kind of Happy Meal toy.

We got to the orchard in one piece and picked raspberries under the boiling sun. When ripe, they come right off the bush with a satisfying plunk. From time to time, Cade inspected my mouth, as he worried I'd rob the orchard with my occasional cautious consumer taste-testing. This from the guy who will bend over in the middle of Times Square to pick up a nickel. This from the guy who likes to tell a story about how he and Paul once went to a restaurant over vacation and only ordered water and the complimentary biscuits, because they'd spent all of their money at an arcade. When they were teenagers.

He's lucky he helps me with nice things like picking three pounds of raspberries (which I ate in maybe two hours) and looks so cute in that tiny zooming car.

Or maybe it's just me.

Roinks! I'm no longer a teacher!

There's always so much going on that I deem blogworthy, and even if there weren't, there are too many stories left to be shared for me to ever grow tired of this medium.

Umm... Yeah, right.

But really, a lot has happened in the last month or so that I never mentioned. These events were mentionable, but there are only so many hours in a day and I find myself spending more and more time looking for re-runs of Celebrity Fit Club when I'm tired. Mocking Dustin Diamond is much easier than say, creating a really apt metaphor.

But here are some random pictures and a brief recap of what was going on. They look a whole lot better than Cledus T. Judd, whoever the hell that guy is, in his before picture. And the after one.

My photography class ended, and the students' artwork was displayed. The macro shots were a big hit.

This was taken during a brief break in singing. Jody's mid-blink, but there's another shot of this that's even worse. In it, my eyes are closed and I appear to have gone the way of Bambi's mother. Can't have that on the internet - my "good" pictures are incriminating enough.

This baboon got really angry when the seventh graders I chaperoned on The Bronx Zoo field trip moseyed on over to his featured habitat. I think it's because they were making fun of his bright pink boobies.

Here's another creature from The Bronx Zoo, which just happened to be the best field trip ever. Doesn't this animal look like a microphone? Free gift to anyone who can tell me what it's called. ("Is this thing on?" isn't it).

Walking the trash-strewn streets of Harlem this morning, I ran into Renee. She was the first person at my school with whom I really clicked. We roomed together at the Mohonk staff retreat and spent the few days realizing how much we had in common. In the hotel, we blared Fiona Apple and went to an a cappella performance. We sat on a porch overlooking the lake and talked about our hang-ups and contradictions. Renee was as interested in milking the trip for all it was worth as I was, and was up for canoeing, taking a guided nature walk, and going horseback riding.

And then the good ol' days came to an abrupt end. School started and unlike at the retreat, my bosses were present. Renee went off to the lower grades and I was mired in middle, the bastard stepchild of the progressive charter school where I've spent the last school year of my life. We had a professional development series that kept us together for a series of Thursdays, and I lived for those days. It was a day off and though I already knew I didn't want to teach anymore, I didn't mind learning. I've never minded it, especially when there are complimentary cookies and drinks.

Over drinks last Thursday, Renee stuck her finger in my face, and said, "The beginning of the year, I expected more from you. You, of all people, were the one I knew I'd be tight with! And I'm really not. It's sad."

It really is. Things don't always turn out how we anticipate. Not working together was a barrier, but so was the inclination to not be the initiator or to procrastinate the connection. This goes for all facets of life, including my career change: Putting things off doesn't make anyone happier, but it sure is comfortable. And comfort is highly overrated, my friends.

After I conceded that she and I totally squandered the possibility of the last ten months, Renee and I agreed to get our acts together and embrace the sisterhood. We talked about matters completely inappropriate in mixed company, and then you know, the Disney sing-along finale. I hope we make good on the promise. I can't say I know it will happen, but I know that I want it to.

So back to this morning. I told Renee, "I'm still so busy with things, and so ready for a change, that I almost can't muster up the energy to be wistful." She kind of chuckled.

But wistful, or at least, reflective, is what is owed to any experience that had some good in it. That's what I think anyway. Teaching has not been a waste of two years. I've probably learned more than I actually taught. I haven't been able to care nearly as much as the media says I should - with a selfless heart bursting with cliches and inventive grammar lessons involving hip hop. I am no child's savior or confidante or surrogate mom.

I just want the kids from the school I'm leaving to know that they've troubled me as much as they've entertained me. Scratch that, they've troubled me a bit more. But only a tiny bit.

They should be aware that I have pictures of them on my refrigerator and my hard drive. That I've shared their stories at countless social gatherings. That I've dreamt of them.

That I am a better person because I've known them.

If books truly are the "children of the brain," as someone once said, then I haven't mommy blogged in awhile. (Hey, maybe not quite my children. But someone's children, right)? Because I'm swamped with job hunting, tutoring on the side, and finishing the school year, I haven't been reading a book each week. I'm currently reading Lovemarks: The Future Beyond Brands in preparation for the new job - a book which really isn't that dull and even has large font - but I can't read more than ten pages at a time. Too many other things beckon me. The dishes curse under their breath about my not having washed them. The clock whines to be heeded. My bed holds me down and won't let me sit up.

But I have read (or tried to read) a bit over the weeks, and here are my findings:

1) The kids I tutor are really bright, not to mention well-behaved and considerate. I like those qualities in children I teach. The only thing they struggle with is reading comprehension and critical thinking. I'm assigning Jing, my younger student, poems and news articles to read and write about. She's quite adept with symbolism and figurative language. We started the study by discussing Rihanna's song "Umbrella," and have graduated to books that are not nasal, annoying, and overplayed. This week we're having our final discussion of Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, one of the coolest fantasies ever.

Why didn't I write this book? Why don't I own the movie? Why aren't YOU watching or reading right now?

2) Weeks ago, I went to an Alison Bechdel reading. Bechdel is the cartoonist responsible for "Dykes to Watch Out For," the comic that I have been unabashedly caught reading on the subway. She's also the author of the amazingly fabulous, poignant, remarkably smart graphic memoir Fun Home. At the reading, Bechdel used a projector to show the strip illustrations while reading aloud. She also showed her process of illustrating and writing separately, including primary sources like family photos and letters from her parents. It was so cool!

I wish I had the artistic ability to become a graphic novelist, but am hoping to delve further into the genre to live vicariously. Of course, I gushed just this to Bechdel when she signed my copy of Fun Home.

It's always hard to talk to a real writer, though I know they're not so different from the rest of us. But Bechdel is kind of awkward, and I think, better with a pen or computer keyboard than speech. I can relate. She signed my book and agreed to a picture. She didn't get caught staring at my breasts, which is more than I can say for Chuck Palahniuk.

*I made our picture the blueish color as an homage to the illustrations in Fun Home. Alison Bechdel, won't you join my literary circle of best friends?! David Sedaris says he approves.

3) The last book that really held me captive was The Mistress's Daughter by A.M. Homes. I believe it was on my birthday list. Highly lauded in the press, I didn't actually expect as much as I got - a riveting true story that led me to ponder the mystery of my own parents. How well do we ever know who they are? Is it necessary for ties to be severed before we can really scrutinize them objectively? The book is well-written and I recommend it more than Ant Farm, which I know was on my birthday list. Nothing too remarkable in that one.

I'm disappointed.

Some friends and I went to a bar tonight and sang Disney songs really loudly, and I recorded the whole thing.

But it turns out, I forgot to press the record button, and now those drunken renditions from Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid are gone.

Darn!

Hello, I'm for real.

Here's a new claim to fame: If you type "icy hotness" into Google, my blog is the tenth result. Brr, baby, brr!

I really appreciate Manhattan Mini Storage's billboards.

So does my uterus.


*brought to my attention by www.feministing.com

I just read that Keri Russell had her first child on the Yahoo! mainpage. Upon this discovery, I headed to Wikipedia, because I don't know, it suddenly struck me that I needed to know the exact year she cut her hair off and upset Felicity's ratings. I found out that she gave birth on June 9, but her publicist finally announced it today.

Something that happened on June 9 finally making the papers?" I pondered. "That took a while."

Then it hit me: Minutes before, I had just finished writing a press release about an event that happened on June 9, the exact same day! The stars are totally aligning and stuff!

But actually, I think I'm just going crazy.

So umm, I guess I'm typing this to mention (belatedly) that I'm writing in the marketing/public relations realm nowadays, as someone is giving me the opportunity to build a portfolio and also kindly helping me through the career change. This has been going on for months. It's one of the reasons I don't have as much time to blog - that and the tutoring and the Brooklyn adventures and the exhausting end of the school year.

Oh yes, and the crazy.

Ten Things My Daddy Taught Me Or At Least, Tried To

10) Gray is the best color, because it has few variations. There is light gray and there is dark gray. There is no turquoise gray.

9) Fart sounds do nothing but enhance our daily lives. Real farts, though, are an entirely different animal.

8) I'd better get a good education, because a hard day's work (outside) and a cool glass of water would bury me.

7) There's no better place to open up than on the open road with the radio off, the stars bright, and a pile of luggage in the back seat.

6) You don't have to know what "homemade hell" is to know that it's really bad to be uglier than it.

5) "Kiss me, sponge" is a universal endearment.

4) Shooting a b.b. gun at the neighbor's cat is okay, as long as his or her cat beats the crap out of your cat.

3) He's always available in long distance phone calls, person, or spirit to shoot the breeze, save the day, or just listen.

2) "Don't think I won't spank your butt right here, in front of God and everyone!"

1) It's not where you start, but where you finish.



Happy Father's Day!

Today I told my students I will be leaving.

Bernice asked, "When?"

"The last day of school," I replied.

Did she expect an end to the sentence? Something like "...in five years after barely making more money that I do now" or "...after being fired for just losing it one day"?

I explained my decision diplomatically and didn't even mention that thing that rhymes with schmadministration and schmself-schmactualization.

The kids were frowny for awhile, but then perked up. They realized the new path on which I'm about to embark calls for a celebration in the near future. Well, that, and when isn't it the right time for some bodega juice and chips?

I'm on my way to a job interview. It's hot outside, and I'm starting to sweat in my suit jacket. I'm on the East Side, which I don't normally go to. I came out of the wrong subway entrance and am trying to figure out how to get to Third Avenue. I approach the first person I see - a homeless man.

Me: Hi. Do you know which way is Third Avenue?

Man: [pausing dramatically] The baby Jesus knows.

Me: Uhhh.

Man: Did you hear me? [looking deeply into my soul] The baby Jesus knows everything, young lady.

Me: So... Uhhh... Does the baby Jesus say it's that way? [pointing behind me]

Man: Yes.

My dad used to like to tease my mom about how the more educated she became, the less she actually knew how to do. I viewed this as an overt display of insecurity that he was married to a woman with both nice boobs and a Master's degree, when he merely finished high school, followed by a few college courses. And he doesn't have nice boobs, either.

But my dad is one of those geniuses who can fix anything. (He also has a heart of gold, but that's an entirely different story). He knows how everything works in all its mechanical intricacies. My family never had to take a car or any other piece of machinery to a repair shop. Daddy would fix it in the driveway or his home office. We had illegal satellite television for years. He built a spa room onto our old house. My science projects showed an amazing scientific aptitude I sure as hell don't have. (What fourth grader makes an electromagnetic device? All the other kids were testing which bubble gum has the longest lasting flavor).

I'm reminded of my dad when I realize that despite all those A's, I don't know a damn thing about home maintenance. Last time he visited, the circuit to my bathroom and kitchen lights blew. While I was sorry my dad spent much of his time that day tending to the repairs, I was relieved it didn't happen while I was by myself. Because then I'd have to rely on Isa. I might spend three weeks peeing, showering, and microwaving something in the dark while the not-so-super super dillydallied on the stoop (beer in hand, of course) or in the cool of his basement apartment. Doing important things. Like picking his nose and playing with lottery scratch-off cards.

So then I couldn't sleep one night. I tried to sleep, but couldn't turn my brain off. At least, not about those liberal arts things I think. Or some magazine article about thin people who are technically overweight. That one really got to me.

I decided to do the dishes with all this energy. I was washing this cylindical cookie tin my mom sent me for my birthday. I wasn't thinking about physical science or the fact that the lid fit perfectly inside the sink's drain. I didn't notice this until it was stuck in the drain and wouldn't come out, as a matter of fact.

I had a problem. The sink was stopped up with no solution in sight. I had to use some bowls to remove the soapy water. Now I needed to figure out how to get that tin out. The edges of my kitchen utensils didn't work. My dad would roll over in his grave (except he's not dead) if he knew my first thought was, "Hmmm... If only I had a really strong magnet right now."

Then I decided I'd need my drill, but I've never used it. So I used the hammer, because I thought it would help. I didn't think about how it's not so smart to push the obstruction into the hole. I blame the fact that I didn't play with Legos as a child.

I sent Cade an email: "Plumbing emergency! Your assistance needed tomorrow!" I like getting him to help me with my home repairs, because he's also retarded in this area, and I feel better that us two Family Handyman rejects found each other.

The next day, Cade fixed everything. It only took him twenty-five minutes with a drill, nail, hammer, old decorative railroad tie, and wrench. I could just imagine what my dad would say: "Geez! How many college degrees does it take to get anything done around here? A hard day's work and a cool glass of water would bury you, girl!"

The subway stopped. Cade and I watched the conductor come out of his little compartment, announcing a momentary delay as he walked off the train. He puffed to the next car with a short man following him. "It's in this car," the man said to the conductor, sounding as eager to please as a child.

The more curious straphangers stood to rubberneck. Cade said maybe it was a fight. Or an unconscious passenger. Or maybe, maybe he should stretch his legs right about now. Before he could stand and gawk with the rest of those guys who got sidelined on their way to dinner in Koreatown, the conductor stepped out of the next car, gingerly holding a backpack.

"Hey, look! If you see something, say something," I whispered, reciting those ads all over the subway stations.

Not that the backpack looked especially menacing. It was small and far from brimming with explosives. If it were ticking, the sounds would probably be coming from a pedometer or a Tamagotchi. Still, I guess you never know. We did recently see Day Night Day Night.

We watched the conductor give the backpack a shake and then carry it back to his compartment on our car.

"Yay! The explosives will get to us first!" Cade exclaimed in mock terror. "It's been nice knowing you, Mandy, but I wish we could die on a full stomach."

"Well, I'm not that hungry," I replied.

Neither was the conductor. I think he ate some kid's afternoon snacks out of that backpack the rest of the way.

I was walking in my neighborhood yesterday when I heard a man call out, "Hey!"

After turning around, I saw that it was some guy just coming home from work. He was outside his building, a few yards from me, and leaning over the railing to the stairs that lead to his apartment building's basement. This is where many building supers live, Isa included.

"Hey!" He leaned farther over, adjusting his laptop bag. "I've told you already - I'm gonna call the cops if you don't smoking crack down there!"

My curiosity was thoroughly piqued. I listened for a response.

Some muttering. The clang of a trashcan lid. I heard feet on the stairs.

"It would be too funny if the super of that building begrudgingly put down his crack pipe and came up," I thought.

Alas, just a regular old crackhead. His face bore a deathly grimace.

"Thanks," the guy clipped as he smoothed his collar, readjusted the laptop bag, and keyed into the bulding.

I went on another job interview today at a really big firm. The human resources person interviewing me asked if I would consider working with the technology or digital communications industry clients. I said yes, and imagined the shock in Cade's eyes if I got a marketing job dealing with technology.

He'd be incredulous. "You don't even know how to select 'New Tab'! You always click on 'New Window'! And you've got tons of crap on your desktop! You didn't even know what an external hard drive was until your Powerbook got so despondent about its obesity that it nearly committed suicide!"

A job spreading the buzz about the latest technological innovations would be a stretch for me - I can admit it.

Here's something else I can admit: I just realized that I can click on site meter and find out what some blog visitors were searching for when they came across Amanda's MsAdventures. Contrary to popular lament, only tame stuff seems to lead to me:

"things my mama taught me"
"pepto bismol song"
"arby commercial"
"rocking horse bar nyc straight?"
"very nearsighted lady contact lens stuck in eye"

Except for:

"ding dong boobs"

*I love technology!

There's a certain rage where you lose sense of all socialization. You graduate from street smarts and contextualization to the desire to sink your teeth into someone's flesh, pummeling and puncturing everything you can reach.

It's not the anger I felt at the post office when the drug-addled clerk continued to eat a muffin instead of checking for my package, yelling and spraying crumbs in my direction. It's not the anger of a woman scorned or backstabbed or denied.

It's an entirely different animal, and I felt it today.

This afternoon, I was supposed to meet with an eighth grader I was hired to tutor. I already tutor the daughter of a family friend who recommended me. These kids are a completely different demographic from the one I've been teaching. They are "model minority" kids to the nth, with zealously involved parents, competitive schooling, and a slew of extra-curricular activities. Tutoring gives me extra money, which is nice, but also some time working with the kinds of students that are easiest to work with. I loves me some driven, polite children.

I thought I'd take the subway and get to our tutoring location with no problem. I left early and waited, realized the commute was not going to work, and decided to take a cab. I am loathe to take cabs when it's not dangerously late and I'm not intoxicated. Flagging down a cab was easy enough; I had $13 dollars that would cover the fare. I sat back and watched the driver head to Broadway and then start driving in the wrong direction.

"Whoa! Where do you think I'm going?" I sat up and re-directed the cabbie, who apologized in a way that told me he would not drop the charge already on the meter. I sighed and soon found myself stuck in traffic, nowhere near my destination but approaching my cash limit. How was I over forty blocks away and at $11?

He was at a familiar corner when I decided this wasn't working. I'd have to cancel the tutoring appointment and set a new location, as the traffic and subway route changes would make it extremely difficult for me to get there. The cabdriver pulled over and let me out. I gave him the $13, tipping him despite his gaffe, and headed out. I'm mentioning this detail so no one can cite instant karma when I get to the rage part of my story.

I walked a few blocks back in the general direction of my apartment. I'd have a long walk home. A grizzly man on the sidewalk was sitting around, chortling, "It'll be a murder-suicide! I'm taking everyone with me!" He sneered at me convincingly. I saw two fat teenage boys walking out of a store on my right. I didn't notice more than that. I walked past before they left the shade of its awning.

And then I felt cold water, or thought I felt it. I touched the back of my pants. The boys had squirted cold water all over my butt and the back right sleeve of my shirt! I was dumbfounded, completely in shock. I turned around, and they had crossed the street. They were holding a water bottle - the kind with the nozzle you can squirt - and laughing under the elevated train tracks. It felt like I stood there for five minutes, unaware of anything going on in the world around me, in shock that two children would do such a thing to an adult they don't know.

One of my fingers did the only thing it could think to do. They began to curse at me. I couldn't even speak. Probably only a growl would come out if I tried. I was LIVID! I nearly ran across the street, under the tracks to fight them. My heart was pounding and my muscles were tensed to spring into retaliation. But then my brain got just enough blood flowing to think of what two fat teenagers of my height could do to only one of me. And how bad it would be if I were hit by a car or hurt or arrested for killing two kids that natural selection will take care of sooner or later. (I'm hoping sooner).

I stumbled forward. A man stood outside the next store over. He watched me stoically. "Did you see what those kids did?" He shook his head, impervious to my distress. "They just squirted water all over...me."

I nearly said "my butt," because it was the target. The act wasn't a joke, it was meant to intimidate me with no consequence. It was sexual harassment, which I am no stranger to, but I have never had someone actually do anything to me. I'd rather hear the uncensored desires or observations of a million oglers than ever have one (or two) do something to me. And the kids that did this, I have taught many like them. From that neighborhood, of the same age and ethnicity and socioeconomic level. I won't accept any prejudiced justification for any of this. I have never been so enraged or disrespected by complete strangers.

It was cold water, but you can't convince me it wasn't a weapon.

I write this blog in a most delinquent fashion, and most people who read and actually know me like to tell me this. Especially women who breastfed me. If the blog comes up, my mom loves to pointedly mention that she no longer reads. She says this like one might say, "I quit smoking," when offered a light. Almost arrogantly.

According to her, the blog has too much Fluff ("I don't even watch those videos or whatever they are...") and not enough humorous stories about NYC. She also thinks I complain too much about children and uncharacteristically, have only sappy things to say about Cade.

Yesterday, my mom was in an accident and broke her tiny little leg - at 4'10", my mom really is tiny. She has to be off her feet for at least five days, something she hasn't done in about 24 years. This is probably inaccurate, because maybe she was always Wonderwoman. But I like to think my mom was occasionally lazy before she had kids. I need to relate to her somehow.

Maybe I'll try to conjure something funny to write just for her. I always have ideas rolling around in my head. I don't usually blog them until my brain starts feeling like a set of maracas and I have the time. Those two things don't always coincide.

Until then, I want to reflect on writing:

1) On Wednesday, I was linked on Gawker.com. This came as a complete surprise. I got back from a book signing on Wednesday, and had numerous angry comments about how Boston is actually very cool, much cooler than NYC, and I have missed this because I am stupid. Neato!

I then found out I could thank Gawker for bringing some new haters my way. Thanks, Gawker! I'm grateful for the publicity and all, but I wish the site had linked something else I wrote, as the Boston entry was typed in ten minutes with little effort. And as always, I don't think it was offensive at all. There are worse things to be than dull. Boston could be horrendously polluted, though with some of those comments, I now think there might be something in the water...

It is very rare that I get called a hillbilly by random people on the Internet and very rare that people chastise me for not being a better Texan ambassador in the Northeast, which I think is the lamest argument ever. I didn't move to the Northeast to better relations between the North and South. I'm not Abe Lincoln or something. I moved to get more out of life, to teach and be taught, and because I've always loved NYC.

2) On Friday, I was sent the sample copy of my pages as they will appear in the book in which I will be published. I'm being asked to cut a few lines where I see fit, as page count is an issue. It's really cool seeing my words in the book's font and cut to fit book pages. The book is set to come out in September, and I will share more about that later.

3) There is no three. Not yet, anyway. I have at least three pieces of writing that I will try to get published starting in July. As the school year winds down and I finalize future employment, I just don't feel like getting into it right now. I've promised myself I will snap out of that this summer.

Months ago, my co-teacher asked some students to create temporary labels for some book bins in our classroom library. A new shipment of books had come and we wanted students to have access right away.

We forgot about the library revamping project and never made permanent bin labels, because, you know, we were so wrapped up in saving the children. Yesterday, I was trying to track down one particular book when I discovered my new favorite genre: