So this morning I had my dog walk with the sweet and lovely person I don't want to date!
Going into it, I was a little apprehensive. The email she sent yesterday afternoon to confirm was all "I need to relearn how to have fun", in a kind of "I hope to be relearning with you, my darling..." way. Eek.
We had a nice walk, though. She actually showed me a hidden gem of a little park that I'm so happy to know about - and shocked that I'd never seen before, considering that I once lived a mere three or so blocks from it! She is very interesting (though perhaps slightly too chatty-with-few-words-in-edgewise for me).
Anyway, as we approached the place where we were going to go our separate ways, I started to feel nervous about what plans she was going to want to make for getting together again. Sure enough, she said, "the lesbian and gay film festival is on right now." (Duh!! I know, that's bitchy - and don't worry, I didn't say anything like that - but that's a huge event. I don't live under a rock!) She started skirting around the "did I want to catch something together" question. I reeled off the three screenings I have tickets for, and then quickly said, "And then I'm going out of town for a week." Which is true - early Thursday morning I'm leaving for my dad's city for a few days, in part to run the half-marathon, and then going from there to Saskatoon for the Congress.
It was, perhaps, graceless, but I think I was able with that move to make her understand that I'm not up for dating. If I were, I'd surely have invited her to one of my films or volunteered the idea of getting together as soon as I get back. And this way, we got to avoid having any kind of awkward conversation about "monkishness", "I'm-a-messiness", or "I'm sleeping with my so-called ex". It was probably the wimpy way out, but I think it worked. She said that if I wanted to go for another dog walk sometime, I should get in touch.
It is interesting to me how uninterested I am in her, in any kind of romantic or sexual way. Like I said before, on paper, she's definitely "my type".
Anyhoo. It's a gorgeous day out. I shouldn't be in here writing this, I should be out in the sun doing my errands and eating a popsicle on a bench!
Saturday, May 19, 2007
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Unknowable outcomes
"But I have to admit that there is a demand in my writing...that a sort of opening, play, indetermination be left, signifying hospitality for what is to come [l'avenir]: 'One does not know what it means yet, one will have to start again, to return, to go on'..."
-J. Derrida
OK, I know it's gross of me to open a blog post with a quotation from Derrida, but it's just that this - which I read in the context of doing some research for the paper I am now writing - captures my writing anxiety perfectly. I know he was writing about a very different context - the notorious difficulty of his own work - but if I work on the terrain of the literal with this quotation (vile traitor that I am) it tells what is happening to me with this paper I'm writing. Which is just an intensification of my writing process in general.
Which is that I never know what's going to happen. And that stresses me out. Big time.
I have tried to be the kind of writer who plans. But every time I try to write an outline, I end up with approximately three point form notes. And they don't correspond to anything that actually unfolds in the work, in the end.
For this new conference paper, which I have to have finished a week from yesterday, I started with nothing. I didn't even have a three-point 'outline'. I had a couple of questions. They aren't going anywhere very fast, though yesterday I finally sat down to write and came up with a relatively paltry 750 words. It is like I watch what pours out of me and am estranged from it...I don't know what's going to happen. That indeterminacy, that very strong element of chance, seems somehow wrong and bad an unscholarly of me. When I make a choice to go in Direction X, and am leaving behind all the other possible directions, it is terrifying because I don't even know what all those other possibilities are...because they only become clear to me in the writing. So if I don't pursue them, I'll never know them -- and what if one was the "right" one, or at least a better one??
It's so random.
And it seemed that yesterday, maybe because this is the most opaque paper I've ever written (I mean, opaque to me, the writer) what came out was some kind of crazily over-confident tone. I had been reading all of these special issues of important journals on [Theme I'm Writing About] - unbeknownst to me, I seem to have picked something a bit trendy (with my interest stemming from the appearance of this theme in the stuff I am working with in my book project). So all these special issues are unfailingly robust and clever. The editors' introductions are all written with the ease and suaveness and confidence of people who know what the hell they're talking about - and they know it damn well. There are keynote addresses reproduced in these journals - wry, funny, learned. And exceedingly confident. They're senior academics, leaders in their fields. What do you expect? And I've seen that my writing in this paper is mimicking this kind of tone...it's still full of questions, but it's all clever and witty and obliquely jokey...and so very...not me. I don't know what's going on. But I'm going to bear it out and see, I guess. It could make me look like a complete idiot, though - like some insufferably poncey junior academic trying to be something she's not...And it doesn't match the uncertainty with which I am approaching this theme, not at all. Perhaps that's it - I'm borrowing this tone to cover up the fact that I'm just not sure. And that would be -- ugh.
Let's hope that some certainty comes by the end of the paper, otherwise there will have to be a major tonal revision.
-J. Derrida
OK, I know it's gross of me to open a blog post with a quotation from Derrida, but it's just that this - which I read in the context of doing some research for the paper I am now writing - captures my writing anxiety perfectly. I know he was writing about a very different context - the notorious difficulty of his own work - but if I work on the terrain of the literal with this quotation (vile traitor that I am) it tells what is happening to me with this paper I'm writing. Which is just an intensification of my writing process in general.
Which is that I never know what's going to happen. And that stresses me out. Big time.
I have tried to be the kind of writer who plans. But every time I try to write an outline, I end up with approximately three point form notes. And they don't correspond to anything that actually unfolds in the work, in the end.
For this new conference paper, which I have to have finished a week from yesterday, I started with nothing. I didn't even have a three-point 'outline'. I had a couple of questions. They aren't going anywhere very fast, though yesterday I finally sat down to write and came up with a relatively paltry 750 words. It is like I watch what pours out of me and am estranged from it...I don't know what's going to happen. That indeterminacy, that very strong element of chance, seems somehow wrong and bad an unscholarly of me. When I make a choice to go in Direction X, and am leaving behind all the other possible directions, it is terrifying because I don't even know what all those other possibilities are...because they only become clear to me in the writing. So if I don't pursue them, I'll never know them -- and what if one was the "right" one, or at least a better one??
It's so random.
And it seemed that yesterday, maybe because this is the most opaque paper I've ever written (I mean, opaque to me, the writer) what came out was some kind of crazily over-confident tone. I had been reading all of these special issues of important journals on [Theme I'm Writing About] - unbeknownst to me, I seem to have picked something a bit trendy (with my interest stemming from the appearance of this theme in the stuff I am working with in my book project). So all these special issues are unfailingly robust and clever. The editors' introductions are all written with the ease and suaveness and confidence of people who know what the hell they're talking about - and they know it damn well. There are keynote addresses reproduced in these journals - wry, funny, learned. And exceedingly confident. They're senior academics, leaders in their fields. What do you expect? And I've seen that my writing in this paper is mimicking this kind of tone...it's still full of questions, but it's all clever and witty and obliquely jokey...and so very...not me. I don't know what's going on. But I'm going to bear it out and see, I guess. It could make me look like a complete idiot, though - like some insufferably poncey junior academic trying to be something she's not...And it doesn't match the uncertainty with which I am approaching this theme, not at all. Perhaps that's it - I'm borrowing this tone to cover up the fact that I'm just not sure. And that would be -- ugh.
Let's hope that some certainty comes by the end of the paper, otherwise there will have to be a major tonal revision.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Predictable
Maggie asked for some more details on the old sleeping-with-ex-GF front.
Hmmm...
I guess, what can you expect when you are staying over at each other's places at least once a week - if not more - talking every day, cuddling when you see each other, and generally acting more placidly loving than you had for a long time before you broke up?
It's happened twice - the first time was about a week ago. After that, I worried that it was a baaaaad idea...that it would just make my angst-ridden leaving to a faraway place that much more upsetting. But she said, probably rightly, "It's going to be be brutal no matter what...so we may as well." Too true - given how close we are now, it'll be very, very yucky. Though she has already booked a trip to come and see me for eight days at the end of August.
So yeah, it happened, and then it happened again. And it was familiar (in a good way) and lovely.
But the interesting thing is, since it happened, we've actually had some conflict. We hadn't, really, at all up until now. (I mean, since the breakup -- there was plenty of conflict before that!)There was a classic, stupid Hilaire-and-ex-GF argument about nothing on the weekend, which I ended with an exasperated acknowledgement that we had started fighting again as soon as we were having sex again. Which cracked us up. (To be fair, I think this argument had a lot to do with a freaking terrible mood I was in on the weekend, for various reasons having to do with my work and my move - about which I might hope to blog soon.)
We had some tension today, too, though. And this was mostly coming from her, though it kind of escalated and I said a colossally ridiculous thing. (We both quickly realized how bad an idea this was, and apologized to each other.) And what this one was about was really her grief at my leaving - she admitted that.
So, I don't know. On one hand, I think it's true that we're in a tight spot no matter what - it's gonna hurt when I leave. But I do note that these kind of more volatile emotions have come up in the wake of sleeping together. Which might seem to suggest that it's not such a good idea. But so hard to know where/how to draw the line, you know?
***
Ah, and on that note of emotional volatility and confusion, off I go in half an hour to have dinner with my mother! Who often cries when she sees me, because I am, er, not at my best with her! The other night, though, she got angry at me. For not calling her for two weeks. This was a new note - anger instead of tears. So now we're having dinner!! And she wants to "talk"! Good god!! About coming to visit me in my faraway place. And about a large sum of money. And also, presumably, about my terrible behaviour. Fun times all around.
Hmmm...
I guess, what can you expect when you are staying over at each other's places at least once a week - if not more - talking every day, cuddling when you see each other, and generally acting more placidly loving than you had for a long time before you broke up?
It's happened twice - the first time was about a week ago. After that, I worried that it was a baaaaad idea...that it would just make my angst-ridden leaving to a faraway place that much more upsetting. But she said, probably rightly, "It's going to be be brutal no matter what...so we may as well." Too true - given how close we are now, it'll be very, very yucky. Though she has already booked a trip to come and see me for eight days at the end of August.
So yeah, it happened, and then it happened again. And it was familiar (in a good way) and lovely.
But the interesting thing is, since it happened, we've actually had some conflict. We hadn't, really, at all up until now. (I mean, since the breakup -- there was plenty of conflict before that!)There was a classic, stupid Hilaire-and-ex-GF argument about nothing on the weekend, which I ended with an exasperated acknowledgement that we had started fighting again as soon as we were having sex again. Which cracked us up. (To be fair, I think this argument had a lot to do with a freaking terrible mood I was in on the weekend, for various reasons having to do with my work and my move - about which I might hope to blog soon.)
We had some tension today, too, though. And this was mostly coming from her, though it kind of escalated and I said a colossally ridiculous thing. (We both quickly realized how bad an idea this was, and apologized to each other.) And what this one was about was really her grief at my leaving - she admitted that.
So, I don't know. On one hand, I think it's true that we're in a tight spot no matter what - it's gonna hurt when I leave. But I do note that these kind of more volatile emotions have come up in the wake of sleeping together. Which might seem to suggest that it's not such a good idea. But so hard to know where/how to draw the line, you know?
***
Ah, and on that note of emotional volatility and confusion, off I go in half an hour to have dinner with my mother! Who often cries when she sees me, because I am, er, not at my best with her! The other night, though, she got angry at me. For not calling her for two weeks. This was a new note - anger instead of tears. So now we're having dinner!! And she wants to "talk"! Good god!! About coming to visit me in my faraway place. And about a large sum of money. And also, presumably, about my terrible behaviour. Fun times all around.
Monday, May 14, 2007
Uh oh
I think I was surreptitiously fixed up on the weekend. Urgh.
You see, I have a friend named H. H began a relationship about a year ago with a woman named L. I met L last June when the three of us and another friend went out for drinks. L and I hit it off really well...I went to her birthday thingy a couple of weeks later. Then H left for a job in a faraway city - so no more socializing with H and, by extension, L. I ran into L at an event at the end of September, she drove me home, and that was that.
Lo and behold, in the middle of last week, I got a seemingly off-the-cuff email from L. Such a surprise - I barely recognized her name at first. She said, "some friends and I are going to a show this Saturday...want to come?"
I agreed to go because I'd wanted to see this performance piece. I agreed to go, too, out for dinner with a whole bunch of people I'd never met in my life. On Saturday, L emailed me and her friend J, to say, "Let's meet all these folks the two of you have never met at such-and-such restaurant at 6:30." I recognized J's name - remembered meeting her and having a nice chat with her at the birthday thing last summer.
It occurred to me, then - with a kind of horror - that it was quite possible J and I were being set up -- without telling us (or me, at least). I can imagine it - H and L talking about their two friends who could use a summer fling, and cooking up some kind of plan. When I told ex-GF what I was doing Saturday night, her first question was, "are you being set up?" So it wasn't only me who sensed something fishy.
So, I went to dinner and to the show. J was really lovely - I liked her a lot. We chatted easily. We are living just a few blocks away from each other right now, and both doing the joint-custody thing with our dogs and our exes. We talked about dog walking and great food places in the vicinity. It was all lovely, and she was great - but I didn't feel a spark. (I am pretty much the opposite of sparks right about now, I'd say - I'm kinda not feeling very attraction-y at all --well, okay, except that I've started sleeping with ex-GF. Sshhh...I know, I know...) She's the kind of person I should - whatever that means - be interested in, but I'm not feelin' it, for reasons related to the kind of state of mind I'm in.
When I was leaving, J acted all shy -- confirming for me some kind of interest. We had talked about taking a dog walk together, and I said she should get my email from L.
So last night, she emailed me, wondering about a dog walk on Wednesday or the weekend. She asked, at the end, about the provenance of my first name. I wrote back, briefly, not giving much, but did add a PS correcting her first guess about its origin. I proposed a Saturday morning dog walk - I honestly like taking these walks with people, since I have to spend so long doing them every day...I'm always up for walking partners.
The email I got back today was...uh oh...It's not what I want...She was shyly flirting...or at least indicating her interest. She had looked up the meaning of my name. And was throwing the meanings at me in kind of flirty ways - using them to compliment me.
Ack. I don't want this right now. And yet I am pretty much a loser who doesn't know how to indicate that she's nice and all, but I am not up for dating. Especially cause I'm sleeping with my "ex"-GF. How do y'all indicate that you're not interested in that way? (I should know how to do this by now, considering that I'm in my thirties, but I don't...) What have been your strategies for the letting down easy of the exceptionally sweet and gentle person?
You see, I have a friend named H. H began a relationship about a year ago with a woman named L. I met L last June when the three of us and another friend went out for drinks. L and I hit it off really well...I went to her birthday thingy a couple of weeks later. Then H left for a job in a faraway city - so no more socializing with H and, by extension, L. I ran into L at an event at the end of September, she drove me home, and that was that.
Lo and behold, in the middle of last week, I got a seemingly off-the-cuff email from L. Such a surprise - I barely recognized her name at first. She said, "some friends and I are going to a show this Saturday...want to come?"
I agreed to go because I'd wanted to see this performance piece. I agreed to go, too, out for dinner with a whole bunch of people I'd never met in my life. On Saturday, L emailed me and her friend J, to say, "Let's meet all these folks the two of you have never met at such-and-such restaurant at 6:30." I recognized J's name - remembered meeting her and having a nice chat with her at the birthday thing last summer.
It occurred to me, then - with a kind of horror - that it was quite possible J and I were being set up -- without telling us (or me, at least). I can imagine it - H and L talking about their two friends who could use a summer fling, and cooking up some kind of plan. When I told ex-GF what I was doing Saturday night, her first question was, "are you being set up?" So it wasn't only me who sensed something fishy.
So, I went to dinner and to the show. J was really lovely - I liked her a lot. We chatted easily. We are living just a few blocks away from each other right now, and both doing the joint-custody thing with our dogs and our exes. We talked about dog walking and great food places in the vicinity. It was all lovely, and she was great - but I didn't feel a spark. (I am pretty much the opposite of sparks right about now, I'd say - I'm kinda not feeling very attraction-y at all --well, okay, except that I've started sleeping with ex-GF. Sshhh...I know, I know...) She's the kind of person I should - whatever that means - be interested in, but I'm not feelin' it, for reasons related to the kind of state of mind I'm in.
When I was leaving, J acted all shy -- confirming for me some kind of interest. We had talked about taking a dog walk together, and I said she should get my email from L.
So last night, she emailed me, wondering about a dog walk on Wednesday or the weekend. She asked, at the end, about the provenance of my first name. I wrote back, briefly, not giving much, but did add a PS correcting her first guess about its origin. I proposed a Saturday morning dog walk - I honestly like taking these walks with people, since I have to spend so long doing them every day...I'm always up for walking partners.
The email I got back today was...uh oh...It's not what I want...She was shyly flirting...or at least indicating her interest. She had looked up the meaning of my name. And was throwing the meanings at me in kind of flirty ways - using them to compliment me.
Ack. I don't want this right now. And yet I am pretty much a loser who doesn't know how to indicate that she's nice and all, but I am not up for dating. Especially cause I'm sleeping with my "ex"-GF. How do y'all indicate that you're not interested in that way? (I should know how to do this by now, considering that I'm in my thirties, but I don't...) What have been your strategies for the letting down easy of the exceptionally sweet and gentle person?
Friday, May 11, 2007
Mr. K, the newest Marvel hero?
A, who is a photographer, had a little photo shoot with the dogs toward the end of the tmie I was living with her. And then just the other day she downloaded some kind of "make your own comic" program -- and made a comic from those hilarious photo shoot snaps of Mr. K!And frankly? It's true...it's all true...That is how he gets his way.
Monday, May 07, 2007
Being a student again
As I've mentioned, I've been taking ballet since January. The first term ended a few weeks ago - it was fifteen weeks long - and we've (slightly) progressed to the next level.
Though I raised my eyebrows about the teacher's approach the first night of class, I soon saw that there is a (very good) method to her madness. She is a gem. An astoundingly gifted teacher - and she has won awards for her teaching, I found out. I am a *huge* fan of hers - she is young, and has a sparkling, an effervescent personality that incarnates fun for the class, but she is also really skilled at explaining technical things. It's really a pleasure to spend my Monday evenings there.
That said, I have been really attuned, especially over the last few weeks, to what it means to be a student again. (What Now has written about this issue of returning to the classroom as a student -- much more thoughtfully than I am about to.) It started when the teacher - let's call her G - was teaching us a comparatively difficult step one night. I was frustrated; I tend to berate myself when learning any physical activity - it is a fault of mine. So G was teaching us this step and it just felt awkward and weird, to most of us, I think. She asked us to move back to the barre to start it over again, and then she playfully called out - still in her lovely, happy, sing-songy voice - "Ooh, we're getting some attitude. I saw someone roll their eyes there..." And she laughed and brushed it off and that was that.
When she said that, I realized that it had quite possibly been me that she had seen rolling my eyes; I felt as if my eyes had just done something, at any rate. And it had nothing to do with her, not at all. It was just my frustration - I wasn't liking the feeling of this thing we were doing, and didn't want to do it. But I was mortified that I had been seen, had been read like that. Had rolled my eyes at all. I thought of myself as a teacher, of how hurtful that kind of response would be. I fretted about it all week, and then at next Monday's class, I went up to G and apologized, saying it was quite possibly me she had seen rolling my eyes and assuring her that it had had nothing to do with her.
G didn't even remember the incident, but it led to a good conversation about what we perceive, as teachers. She is working on an MFA right now, and says that being a student again, after being a dance teacher, has made her alert to things she wasn't aware of, the first time she was a student.
It is very much the same for me. In the wake of the eye-rolling incident, I am newly aware of my presence in that ballet class. I tend to be overly serious and hard on myself, when I learn things like this. I realize that I often have a sullenness about me that must be quite unnerving, quite unpleasant, from a teacher's perspective. Hell, if I had me in the classroom, I don't know if I'd like me much! So I've been making a conscious effort to catch myself and snap out of my opaque, heavy presence.
It makes me think about my students and the energy they bring to class. How I read them, sometimes, as disengaged or hostile - when they may truly not be. It suggests that I might stop always referring everything back to myself, as an instructor. Stop thinking every reaction, every mood, every face, is about me. At the same time, it makes me want to have a frank conversation with the students about it...to urge them to be aware of the presence they establish in the classroom.
Though I raised my eyebrows about the teacher's approach the first night of class, I soon saw that there is a (very good) method to her madness. She is a gem. An astoundingly gifted teacher - and she has won awards for her teaching, I found out. I am a *huge* fan of hers - she is young, and has a sparkling, an effervescent personality that incarnates fun for the class, but she is also really skilled at explaining technical things. It's really a pleasure to spend my Monday evenings there.
That said, I have been really attuned, especially over the last few weeks, to what it means to be a student again. (What Now has written about this issue of returning to the classroom as a student -- much more thoughtfully than I am about to.) It started when the teacher - let's call her G - was teaching us a comparatively difficult step one night. I was frustrated; I tend to berate myself when learning any physical activity - it is a fault of mine. So G was teaching us this step and it just felt awkward and weird, to most of us, I think. She asked us to move back to the barre to start it over again, and then she playfully called out - still in her lovely, happy, sing-songy voice - "Ooh, we're getting some attitude. I saw someone roll their eyes there..." And she laughed and brushed it off and that was that.
When she said that, I realized that it had quite possibly been me that she had seen rolling my eyes; I felt as if my eyes had just done something, at any rate. And it had nothing to do with her, not at all. It was just my frustration - I wasn't liking the feeling of this thing we were doing, and didn't want to do it. But I was mortified that I had been seen, had been read like that. Had rolled my eyes at all. I thought of myself as a teacher, of how hurtful that kind of response would be. I fretted about it all week, and then at next Monday's class, I went up to G and apologized, saying it was quite possibly me she had seen rolling my eyes and assuring her that it had had nothing to do with her.
G didn't even remember the incident, but it led to a good conversation about what we perceive, as teachers. She is working on an MFA right now, and says that being a student again, after being a dance teacher, has made her alert to things she wasn't aware of, the first time she was a student.
It is very much the same for me. In the wake of the eye-rolling incident, I am newly aware of my presence in that ballet class. I tend to be overly serious and hard on myself, when I learn things like this. I realize that I often have a sullenness about me that must be quite unnerving, quite unpleasant, from a teacher's perspective. Hell, if I had me in the classroom, I don't know if I'd like me much! So I've been making a conscious effort to catch myself and snap out of my opaque, heavy presence.
It makes me think about my students and the energy they bring to class. How I read them, sometimes, as disengaged or hostile - when they may truly not be. It suggests that I might stop always referring everything back to myself, as an instructor. Stop thinking every reaction, every mood, every face, is about me. At the same time, it makes me want to have a frank conversation with the students about it...to urge them to be aware of the presence they establish in the classroom.
Friday, May 04, 2007
Thinking small
I was pretty freaked about my work. I have to write a conference paper for the end of the month, one that I have sort of set up as fairly major. But most of the thinking hasn't been done yet. Eek. On top of that, I had to conceive, in short order, of a paper for a conference in November, since I'm coordinating a panel proposal for said conference. These two papers represent two theoretical pillars of my larger (book) project. They began to seem impossibly huge. I started some reading in relation to the proposal for the fall. I was doing the Big Questions thing...leaping from the object of my study out to some enormous, diffuse field of which I have very little grasp. And I was panicking.
But today, I put away the sidetracking Big Questions books, and I returned, conceptually, to the small questions and intricate details I started with. Ahhh. It was like slipping into a warm bath. I have worked out a problem for the fall paper and pulled my abstract together, along with what I think is a strong panel abstract that ties our three papers together very nicely. Along the way, I browsed through the set of small questions - really, one question - that needs to occupy me for the paper at the end of this month. It will be more than okay, I saw. I can grasp this. It is doable.
I don't know why I continually forget this principle, this imperative to think small. Over and over again, I tie myself up in knots by turning much too soon to questions that are much too large. For me, the hardest thing to learn about being an academic is that the best work lies in intricate, subtle treatments of things. That is ultimately the work that takes my breath away. I hope someday soon that recognition will stick, and I will remember to apply it to my own work from the outset!
But today, I put away the sidetracking Big Questions books, and I returned, conceptually, to the small questions and intricate details I started with. Ahhh. It was like slipping into a warm bath. I have worked out a problem for the fall paper and pulled my abstract together, along with what I think is a strong panel abstract that ties our three papers together very nicely. Along the way, I browsed through the set of small questions - really, one question - that needs to occupy me for the paper at the end of this month. It will be more than okay, I saw. I can grasp this. It is doable.
I don't know why I continually forget this principle, this imperative to think small. Over and over again, I tie myself up in knots by turning much too soon to questions that are much too large. For me, the hardest thing to learn about being an academic is that the best work lies in intricate, subtle treatments of things. That is ultimately the work that takes my breath away. I hope someday soon that recognition will stick, and I will remember to apply it to my own work from the outset!
Friday recipe blogging: pasta with asparagus & lemon
I am just obsessed with asparagus these days. I eat it nearly every day. My usual M.O. is just to quickly roast it in olive oil and balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper, and have it with salad. But I've made a couple of lovely pasta recipes using asparagus lately. I made this one a couple of weekends ago...it was delighfully simple. And quite wonderful. It's from Moosewood Restaurant New Classics.
PASTA WITH ASPARAGUS & LEMON
Serves 6.
Time: 35 minutes
1 1/2 pounds asparagus
1 pound penne or casarecce pasta
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
salt and black pepper to taste
1/4 cup grated Pecorino or Parmesan cheese
Bring a large pot of salted water to boil for the pasta.
Meanwhile, rinse the asparagus, snap off the tough lower stems, and discard them. Cut off 1 1/2 inches of the asparagus tops and reserve. Chop the rest of the stems. Cook the asparagus tips in boiling water to cover for 3 or 4 minutes, until tender. Remove to a colander with a slotted spoon and set aside. In the same pot blanch the chopped asparagus stems for 6 or 7 minutes, until tender. Drain, rinse in cold water, and reserve separately.
Cook the pasta in the boiling water until al dente. While the pasta cooks, puree the asparagus stems, lemon juice, and olive oil in a blender or food processor until smooth. If necessary, add a little of the hot pasta water. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Drain the pasta and transfer it a large bowl. Stir in the asparagus puree, the asparagus tips, and the grated cheese. If the pasta has cooled, stir it in a pot on high heat for 1 or 2 minutes, until hot. Serve immediately.
PASTA WITH ASPARAGUS & LEMON
Serves 6.
Time: 35 minutes
1 1/2 pounds asparagus
1 pound penne or casarecce pasta
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
salt and black pepper to taste
1/4 cup grated Pecorino or Parmesan cheese
Bring a large pot of salted water to boil for the pasta.
Meanwhile, rinse the asparagus, snap off the tough lower stems, and discard them. Cut off 1 1/2 inches of the asparagus tops and reserve. Chop the rest of the stems. Cook the asparagus tips in boiling water to cover for 3 or 4 minutes, until tender. Remove to a colander with a slotted spoon and set aside. In the same pot blanch the chopped asparagus stems for 6 or 7 minutes, until tender. Drain, rinse in cold water, and reserve separately.
Cook the pasta in the boiling water until al dente. While the pasta cooks, puree the asparagus stems, lemon juice, and olive oil in a blender or food processor until smooth. If necessary, add a little of the hot pasta water. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Drain the pasta and transfer it a large bowl. Stir in the asparagus puree, the asparagus tips, and the grated cheese. If the pasta has cooled, stir it in a pot on high heat for 1 or 2 minutes, until hot. Serve immediately.
Thursday, May 03, 2007
A positive change of heart
Oh, I LOVE this time of year. May has always been my favourite month. More than anything, it's the trees...this first week of May, everything is in a light green, fuzzy phase. There's a pale halo of colour around each tree. It's gorgeous.
Also, I feel happy because all of a sudden, the move to Scary City seems about a thousand times less distressing. I sent an email to a contact I'd been given - another academic, who works at another institution in the city, as does his partner. He's an old, old friend of ex-GF's best friend, RockStar (who really is one) - and ex-GF has known him for a million years as well. RockStar had emphatically urged me to contact him, saying he was just about the greatest. So I sent him a little introducory email the other night, saying I was coming and would love to meet him and his partner, etc., etc. I got back the loveliest note, so entirely enthusiastic about my coming and about the fact that there is overlap in our research interests. It reads, in part:
"There's so much we'd both love to talk with you about. We have a couple of good friends up at Uni (mostly in English) and so can introduce you, when you arrive, to some fine souls.
[...]
We've found the town very much not Home City in terms of diversity etc. but also have found some pockets of weirdos and radicals that are very inspiring. I'm on the Board of a kick ass art gallery (Gallery Name), for instance, and Partner and I are a part of a Radical Pedagogy group... plus there's some okay activist stuff going on, and there are tons of writers around."
I cannot tell you how much better this makes me feel. I feel as if they will be such kindred spirits. And this is giving me the elusive proof I needed that there is something else in Scary City, different from all the things that horrified me about it. Also, dudes, I was thinking of starting some kind of radical pedagogy group. And it's already there, and they're in it! How fabulous is that?!
He also put me onto a very useful resource for apartment-hunting, one that I hadn't yet seen and that looks really promising.
Hooray for friendly new people who will help open the right doors for me in Scary City and hopefully make it much less Scary!
Also, I feel happy because all of a sudden, the move to Scary City seems about a thousand times less distressing. I sent an email to a contact I'd been given - another academic, who works at another institution in the city, as does his partner. He's an old, old friend of ex-GF's best friend, RockStar (who really is one) - and ex-GF has known him for a million years as well. RockStar had emphatically urged me to contact him, saying he was just about the greatest. So I sent him a little introducory email the other night, saying I was coming and would love to meet him and his partner, etc., etc. I got back the loveliest note, so entirely enthusiastic about my coming and about the fact that there is overlap in our research interests. It reads, in part:
"There's so much we'd both love to talk with you about. We have a couple of good friends up at Uni (mostly in English) and so can introduce you, when you arrive, to some fine souls.
[...]
We've found the town very much not Home City in terms of diversity etc. but also have found some pockets of weirdos and radicals that are very inspiring. I'm on the Board of a kick ass art gallery (Gallery Name), for instance, and Partner and I are a part of a Radical Pedagogy group... plus there's some okay activist stuff going on, and there are tons of writers around."
I cannot tell you how much better this makes me feel. I feel as if they will be such kindred spirits. And this is giving me the elusive proof I needed that there is something else in Scary City, different from all the things that horrified me about it. Also, dudes, I was thinking of starting some kind of radical pedagogy group. And it's already there, and they're in it! How fabulous is that?!
He also put me onto a very useful resource for apartment-hunting, one that I hadn't yet seen and that looks really promising.
Hooray for friendly new people who will help open the right doors for me in Scary City and hopefully make it much less Scary!
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
Post-grades moods and ruminations
I'm feeling good. Weirdly free. Surprising, considering that yesterday I basically had a stress meltdown, started semi-hyperventilating and had to reach for the Rescue Remedy, which I've never done before (unless it's to give it to the dog.) Reasons: outstanding grading, my drowning in piles of paper, the smartitude and efficiency I must exhibit over the next three weeks, and ex-GF.
Today, yay. It's that I'm really done. I went to Uni City and handed in all my grades today, though I did give Incompletes to three students. Three students of fifty strikes me a fairly high number, actually. But anyway. The point is, I am free. After handing in grades and meeting with Incomplete students to fill out their forms, I also packed up my office at Dream Uni. And got a drive with the contents back to Home City.
So, weirdly free. Good mood tonight, which persisted even though I spent the evening with my mother, she with whom I have the notoriously difficult relationship. This is a definite sign of happiness.
*
So, my thoughts on grading:
I have the pushover problem I have mentioned before. So students feel okay coming to see me about their problems, big and small. And as soon as I hear stories, which are often accompanied by genuine distress, I'm a goner. "Of course you shall have an extension!" I cry. "Take a month! Take as long as you need!"
So what I've decided is that next year I am going to try the five-days'-grace method I've heard of people using. Where the students have five days' lateness grace over the course of the term. They can use it all on one assignment, or spread it across assignments. They don't have to offer an explanation; I don't want to hear it. After they've used their five days, they face severe late penalties unless they have documentation of some kind of serious medical problem or whatever.
I want to try this because I need to find a way to stop hearing the stories. Because it gets me to the spot where I was this last couple of weeks, juggling so many extensions and crises I couldn't, honestly, keep it all straight. Down with the story!!
If anyone has experience with this method that they'd like to share, I'd love to hear it...
*
The other thing related to grading is this:
I was out for a dog walk with A on Saturday. I mentioned that I was still waiting on some assignments, mentioned the perennial state of student emotional crisis I find myself dealing with. These are some of my very top students, I remarked.
A asked, "Are they queer?"
And you know what? For the most part, they are indeed.
I've been thinking a lot about this. About how the university can be such a site of potential, patchy empowerment for some queer youth - especially this university - that it can blind us to the really, really frickin' hard thing it is to be negotiating sexual identity at this stage of their lives. Out in some spaces, very much closeted in others. Really so full of longing, and also of fear. Oh, the painfully split subjects they are, almost all of them. So open, and so vulnerable. I need to remember that homophobia and heterosexism profoundly affect even the most seemingly savvy and self-aware students.
I had a while ago decided that I wanted to be on the Human Rights and Equity committee at my new position - that would be my service (aside from, ahem, coordinating a little program). I had thought of creating a Positive Space campaign, which the campus doesn't currently have. This only reaffirms my commitment to doing that. But more than that, I want to create a way to begin to address the mundane hardships or at least weirdnesses of being a queer student - not the spectacular injury many face (though that is so important) so much as the ephemeral, almost unnameable aspects of their existence. The things that lead them to my office, always searching...How can there be a language, or at least a recognition, a context, for that?
Today, yay. It's that I'm really done. I went to Uni City and handed in all my grades today, though I did give Incompletes to three students. Three students of fifty strikes me a fairly high number, actually. But anyway. The point is, I am free. After handing in grades and meeting with Incomplete students to fill out their forms, I also packed up my office at Dream Uni. And got a drive with the contents back to Home City.
So, weirdly free. Good mood tonight, which persisted even though I spent the evening with my mother, she with whom I have the notoriously difficult relationship. This is a definite sign of happiness.
*
So, my thoughts on grading:
I have the pushover problem I have mentioned before. So students feel okay coming to see me about their problems, big and small. And as soon as I hear stories, which are often accompanied by genuine distress, I'm a goner. "Of course you shall have an extension!" I cry. "Take a month! Take as long as you need!"
So what I've decided is that next year I am going to try the five-days'-grace method I've heard of people using. Where the students have five days' lateness grace over the course of the term. They can use it all on one assignment, or spread it across assignments. They don't have to offer an explanation; I don't want to hear it. After they've used their five days, they face severe late penalties unless they have documentation of some kind of serious medical problem or whatever.
I want to try this because I need to find a way to stop hearing the stories. Because it gets me to the spot where I was this last couple of weeks, juggling so many extensions and crises I couldn't, honestly, keep it all straight. Down with the story!!
If anyone has experience with this method that they'd like to share, I'd love to hear it...
*
The other thing related to grading is this:
I was out for a dog walk with A on Saturday. I mentioned that I was still waiting on some assignments, mentioned the perennial state of student emotional crisis I find myself dealing with. These are some of my very top students, I remarked.
A asked, "Are they queer?"
And you know what? For the most part, they are indeed.
I've been thinking a lot about this. About how the university can be such a site of potential, patchy empowerment for some queer youth - especially this university - that it can blind us to the really, really frickin' hard thing it is to be negotiating sexual identity at this stage of their lives. Out in some spaces, very much closeted in others. Really so full of longing, and also of fear. Oh, the painfully split subjects they are, almost all of them. So open, and so vulnerable. I need to remember that homophobia and heterosexism profoundly affect even the most seemingly savvy and self-aware students.
I had a while ago decided that I wanted to be on the Human Rights and Equity committee at my new position - that would be my service (aside from, ahem, coordinating a little program). I had thought of creating a Positive Space campaign, which the campus doesn't currently have. This only reaffirms my commitment to doing that. But more than that, I want to create a way to begin to address the mundane hardships or at least weirdnesses of being a queer student - not the spectacular injury many face (though that is so important) so much as the ephemeral, almost unnameable aspects of their existence. The things that lead them to my office, always searching...How can there be a language, or at least a recognition, a context, for that?
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