The Children Have Broken Me
Weekly Roundup #24
It took almost all semester, but my college students broke me. It took until the second to last week of classes to defeat me. I get up at 6am to drive down to Newport for my 8am class, and last Wednesday, 5 out of 16 students showed up. 5. Out of 16. No emails. No reasoning why. They just….weren’t there. The 1pm section wasn’t much better. There’s only so much energy and enthusiasm I can summon when my students are putting in no effort whatsoever.
I’ll have more thoughts about the level of apathy and absenteeism I’ve seen this semester soon, but that’s what did it in for me. Today is the last day of classes at Salve Regina and thank god because I’m not sure I can tolerate much more. Insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result, right?
I did get to see my friend’s dog this week, and got my hair cut, so that made things better. Ahead, what got me through the week when my students didn’t.
What I’m reading:
As I mentioned in a previous weekly roundup, I am way behind on my book count for the year. I only read 4 books in April. I’m not even sure how that happened. But now I’m 6 books behind and need to catch up. So I went through my house and wrote down a list of all of the books less than 250 pages that I could run through, à la the Short Month Short Book challenge I did in February.
And I could do much worse than reading Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. Vuong is a poet by training, so his prose is extra lyrical. The book is about Little Dog, who was born in Vietnam and moved to the States as a child. It’s written in a letter, akin to a love letter, to his mother, who can neither read nor speak English.
Aside from being a compelling and enjoyable read, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous takes place in New England, specifically outside of Hartford, CT. Vuong himself grew up outside of Hartford, and was faculty at UMass Amherst for a while, before moving to NYU. He still lives in Northampton. Why is this all of interest to me? These are all places less than a half an hour from where I grew up. I’m endlessly fascinated to read about ‘my’ part of the world, because it is not often a setting for novels. It’s a familiar sensation to read about tobacco being harvested. Oh yes, if you were unaware, tobacco is one of Connecticut’s largest crops. It can indeed grow that far up north, and there were barns with slits in the side everywhere in the towns where I grew up. The worst was getting stuck behind a tractor transporting tobacco, because those things would only go 10 miles an hour. Vuong’s descriptions make Western Mass and Northern Connecticut seem magical, which is not how I viewed them as a child.
Great for: fans of lyrical prose and short books
Bad for: people who do not like lyrical prose
What I’m writing:
My novel!! Yay!!! But wait - there’s a catch. I’m writing book 2, instead of book 1 😅 Or parts of, at least. I’ve learned that I’m a mood writer in ways that I’m not a mood reader - I really only want to write what I want in that moment, which is really a bummer for getting anything done linearly. I still have yet to figure out how to make this work in service of my novel, but hark! Through yonder window, a plan: my writing group is (lovingly) harassing me to give them chapters, so this might help me prioritize. TBD.
Great for: how my brain is wired
Bad for: the way my brain wants things to get done
What I’m listening to:
The inside of my head is a weird place to be. I am the (self-titled) Queen of Left Hand Turns™️, and can end up somewhere completely different than where a train of thought started.
Case in point: I saw an ad for the new movie "Fall Guy” with Emily Blunt and Ryan Reynolds, which is apparently about a stunt man being chase by the mob of something, I’m not entirely sure. But the trailer had ‘Any Way You Want It’ by Journey in it, and I realized I hadn’t listened to that song in a while. But I wanted a faster version, because I was on a walk, and wanted something with more oomph. Which reminded me of the Glee version, but the Glee version is a medley and in a different key, so I ended up finding this version on Spotify that fit the bill and promptly listened to it on repeat 400 times.1
Great for: Journey fans
Bad for: Journey fans who don’t like remixes
No New Books™️ Challenge:
As I mentioned earlier in the week, I broke my streak. I knew it was coming and I planned for it and I had a great time. The special edition books I ordered have obviously not come in yet, but I did pay a visit to the bookstore across the street from my house. I had a gift card from selling books back to them, *and* they give teacher discounts, so it’s basically like the books were free. When I had 4 books and 4 puzzles in hand, I knew I needed to leave.
The Familiar and Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands were both on a list to buy, and the other two, Beautyland and The Narrow Road Between Desires just caught my eye. Mainly because their covers are both purple and pretty. I do love a theme. I haven’t read the main Kingkiller Chronicles by Patrick Rothfuss, so I might be spoiling things for myself? Who am I kidding, it’ll be months if not years before I read this. Now back to being good and not buying any more books.
Streak to Beat: 50 days (January 1st - February 19th)
Last streak: 46 days (March 16th - April 30th)
Current streak: 3 days (May 1st - Present)
Mug Moment of the Week:
Within my extensive mug collection, I have a subset of Starbucks mugs. And within that subset, is a specific group of their Been There series. Basically, Starbucks sells mugs that are of different places that they have stores. I presume that’s the reasoning, at least. Anyways, this is the Boston version of one of the Been There mugs, in honor of the fact that I went up to Boston yesterday to get my hair cut.
Why go all the way there? Well, I’ve been following my hairdresser, Marisa, around since I was 20. Even when I lived in LA I would visit when I was back on the East Coast. Marisa was in Rhode Island for a bit, and then moved back to the Boston area, and I’m always down for a day trip. Marisa herself has curly hair, so she knows how to work with it, and also, we really enjoy saying, ‘Hi Marissa!’ ‘Hi Marisa!’ ‘Bye Marissa!’ ‘Bye Marisa!’ to each other and weirding out everyone else in the salon. It’s the little things.
My weekend plans include a lot of reading, a lot of grading, a trip to Trader Joe’s and a long walk in the sunshine, as well as a visit to see my Mom for Mother’s Day. (It involves tulips.) May you have a great weekend wherever you are.
I’m not even sure this is an exaggeration.
I don't even directly teach but a breakdown is always guaranteed toward the end of the semester. Don't let them getcha!!!