Paris Lately

Have you been to Paris lately? Don’t worry if you haven’t. It’s still there. Nothing’s changed. City of Lights. And bridges and crepes. And those woven plastic café chairs and waiters who are slightly more friendly than they were twenty odd years ago. Honestly, there have been only one or two notable changes to the activity roster that I’ve noticed since I lived there for my junior year in college, after I first visited with my French class in high school. There’s also a fascinating public art installation phenomenon, which we stumbled upon. The rest is exactly the same. Exactly. It’s sort of astonishing how little changes.

My son and I were just there for Spring Break. We had a grand time. I could write this piece and sprinkle French words throughout it but you’d think I was a pretentious pain in the neck. Not so much if I’d gone to Mexico and sprinkled Spanish. Or Miami. There’s something about Paris that gets everyone’s hackles up, it’s funny. Tell folks you’re going to California or Florida and they say, “Have a good time!” Tell them you’re going to Paris and they say, “Ohh, Paris. Well, la di da” as if it’s some fancy private club. But it’s not. It’s open to the public. And like Bergdorf’s, anyone can go and just browse. You don’t have to shop along the Champs Elysee or stay in fine hotels. There are dumps in Paris, too. It’s cheaper than Disney and you don’t have to be a young couple in love, or a high school kid on a French class trip. You just have to give yourself permission to go.

I choose our travel destinations by the food they serve since I’m traveling with a kid. I don’t want to spend an iota of time hearing complaints about the weird food while I’m on vacation. Needing a rest from all the walking and time spent in yet another museum I can negotiate, but not meals. A full-bellied kid is a complacent kid. I didn’t think I could go wrong with crepes and gelati and French fries galore and I was right. The mass transit is also superb and the entire city upstairs and down, inside and out is clean as can be and safe, as long as you stick to the obvious, which we mostly did.

You name the cliché Parisian highlight and we did it—bateau mouche ride, Sacre Coeur, Musee d’Orsay: check, check, check, plus umpteen more. Though the line at Notre Dame was too long as was the Eiffel Tower’s. But we were happy to toss a tennis ball in the park just below it’s shadow and play a little two square in the plaza in front of the cathedral. I told him he can always visit when he returns one day. Both icons will be there and it’s good to leave something left undone. He nodded and asked to keep playing. As long as we have a tennis ball, there is fun to be had for this boy, a welcome break from the onslaught of cultural enrichment. I never travel without one.

We did have a few new and unusual pleasures along the way. There was the recently opened museum for non-European art and culture—the Quay Branly—that we checked out, very cool. And there was the chic new Marais district that’s blossomed out of the old Jewish quarter since I was there last. We also picnicked and played hide-and-seek in the exquisite Pere la Chaise cemetery and visited the modest yet incredibly comprehensive Musee du Chocolat. We stumbled upon a year old initiative, Les Berges, along the banks of the Siene, which offers free badminton, tetherball, a climbing wall and tabletop games to all who wander up. There was also the astonishing pedestrian bridge behind Notre Dame, which is has been completely covered with ordinary padlocks—thousands of them—inscribed with the names of couples, families and friends from all over the world, who have locked these mementos to the railing of the bridge, or to another padlock. Their brushed brass glistens a dull golden hue from afar, but up close, the locks crowd the railing 5 inches deep, top to bottom and on both sides. One wonders if the bridge will be able to sustain the unexpected weight—and if this charming new tradition was started by a savvy locksmith or hardware store salesman.

The French, bless their arrogant little hearts, are not as crushingly and boarder-line hilariously rude as they used to be. Someone must have wrapped them on the knuckles and told them to shape up or else lose their bread and beurre—wups, slipped—tourists. They are everywhere in Paris, from all over. It’s a constant barrage for Parisians, so it’s a real treat when they make you feel special, as one waiter did for us. It was a simple thing, really. On our third night returning to the same St. Michel café after dinner and a long day of walking and looking, we settled into our favorite sidewalk table in the second row. I sat where a shaft of the day’s last twenty minutes of clear, waning sunlight warmed my face. My son eagerly reached for the Kindle, then dug in, oblivious. Before I could order our usual, the same waiter caught my eye and made a swift pointing gesture to our table with a knowing smirk. I smiled and said, “Oui.” In a moment he returned with our usual order of a panache—beer and lemon soda mixed—and a lemon soda for my son, served each time, curiously, with a long spoon.

I forgot to ask about the long spoon in the tall soda glass. I’m sure he would have responded kindly. I’ll have to remember to ask what it’s for when I return.

Sometimes

(part A- snapping)

Sometimes a nap, is really just a nap

You’re not depressed.  You don’t have cancer.

It doesn’t mean, you’re lazy or a hack.

Sometimes a nap is just a nap.

(part B)

Sometimes a sneeze, is really just a sneeze

You’re not sick.  Don’t have the flu.

Your soul’s not exiting, your body through your nose

So make some noise, let it out, it’s just a sneeze.

(part A)

Sometimes when you, get stuck behind a school bus,

On your way to work, it doesn’t mean take off the day.

It’s not an omen or a harbinger of ruin.

Sometime’s a bus is just a bus.

(part C)

Not everything has to mean something

Sometimes it doesn’t mean a thing,

There’s no hidden message, no secret signifier

It’s just teaching youoooo to push throuuuugh

(part A- key change)

Sometimes the waitress, brings you the wrong dish

It doesn’t mean-- she’s out to get you.

Sometimes a kiss is just a friendly kiss

It means helloooo, hello-hello, it means nothing more than helloooo

It’s nice to see you.

(instrumental)

(part C)

Not everything has to mean something

Sometimes it doesn’t mean a thing,

Life’s just unfolding-- doom’s not in disguise

So get wiiiiiiiiiiiiiise and wipe your eyeeeeeeees

Buck up kid and wipe your eyes

(part A - snapping)

Sometimes a nap, is really just a nap

You’re not depressed.  You don’t have cancer.

You’ve just hit a wall and could use a little shuteye.

Sometimes a nap is just a nap.

Last Bit of Winter

Spring has sprung. Or has it. Just kidding. It totally has and I have tiny white lantern snowdrops in my garden to prove it. But this is not a gardening story. Nay, the garden will have to wait. Until what? Well, since you asked I will tell you, but the answer is goofball at best. I would tell you it must be true because I read it in a book and not on the internet, but really it sounds more like Monty Python-penned myth than anything else. I have a slim volume on olde timey gardening lore, which explains the farmer’s foolproof method for telling when it’s planting time. You should probably pronounce time, “tahm”, in your head if this story is going to feel at all legit. And when I say farmers, think men in overalls and straw hats looking like eager background extras in a local cast production of Oklahoma. So, these farmers would wait until nighttime, drop their trousers and sit bare-arsed on the ground. If the ground was cold to the buttocks’ touch, then it wasn’t planting time yet. However, if that very farmer could drop his trousers and sit comfortably upon the warm earth, then, yes, it was time. Makes absolute sense to me. No, I haven’t tried it.

But, never say never—pun intended. I have other fish to fry. Like how I’m going to empty out the 30 gallon garbage can in my garbage hutch that’s filled with water. Seems the hutch lid was left up by a kindly waste management employee and it rained. A lot. Water filled all the way up to the very top then froze. So now it’s too heavy to lift up and out and can’t be tipped over—no room. I will have to lean over and down into the hutch, head first, and bail out the water now that it’s no longer frozen, trying not to lose my balance and fall, head first, into my garbage can like some cartoon. Come to think of it, I should probably have a spotter. At least it didn’t freeze with a bag of garbage encased in ice. That would be something.

Meanwhile, my son said goodbye to the snow the other day, or what was left of the white snow. He knelt down in our yard, patted it and kissed it goodbye. “See ya,” he said, “it was really fun having you around and I liked how you made everything so bright and cool looking. Plus the sledding was awesome.” I said, “Don’t forget the snow days,” and he said, “Oh, right,” and thanked the snow gods for all the luxurious time away from school. Then he picked up a piece and added it to the plastic cup in our freezer of snow left over from two winters ago. It’s melted a few times when the fridge has gone out, but still counts as snow in my book.

My guilty pleasure this spring will consist of seeing how long it takes the gigunda mountains of filthy snow at all the vast parking lots to melt. Will there still be tiny sooty vestiges of our wintry wonderland left at the end of April? Beginning of May? Some of those piles are mountainous and I imagine teen snowboarders in T-shirts sneaking out at night to hop on their boards one more time in the temperate Springtime air. I also love seeing what’s been buried under those piles all winter. Bits of trash, broken shovels, deflated balls, frozen in time like dinosaur fossils trapped in amber. There are only a scant few weekends left of quiet before the leaf blowers resume their aural assault and the garden explodes, begging for attention. I think I’ll spend them wrapping up indoor projects, picking up errant trash off the street, bailing out my garbage can and watching the black snow unceremoniously disappear.

Iditarod Lady

            I joke about Jersey Girls. You know, the scary ones with big hair and “extra Jerz” who talk tough and are always looking for a fight. I wouldn’t want to meet up with one in a dark alley, but I would want one on my team for dodge ball, or, say, if I were competing in the Iditarod, which I am not, nor will I ever, and this is why.

            I met an Iditarod competitor recently at family resort weekend in the Poconos. Besides ice-skating, laser tag and ping-pong, one could take a dog sled ride, so we went, en masse, to meet the Dog Sled Lady. She had twelve dogs harnessed next to a little shed on the edge of a field. She introduced herself as Kim, and couldn’t have been friendlier. We said hello to the dogs—thinner than I would have thought, turns out they’re bread with greyhounds for speed—then she ushered us inside to tell us her story.

            “My dogs are my family,” Kim said and we all nodded in complete agreement. Growing up in Blairstown, NJ, she bread dogs all her life and never gave away a litter. She worked towards running the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race for ten years, raising $50,000. The race began in 1974 originally to celebrate the famous diphtheria serum run in 1925 that saved children’s lives and to bring awareness to a dwindling sled dog culture, which was being replaced by the snowmobile. Though more people have summated Mt. Everest than have competed in the Iditarod, Kim qualified in 2009, becoming the first person from New Jersey to do so. But not the first woman, there have been lots of those.

            The Iditarod—named for the river, ghost town and race checkpoint-- runs 1,100 miles and takes at least 8 days to race from Anchorage to Nome, sometimes a lot longer. Each dog sled team must begin with 16 dogs and finish with at least six. If dogs become ill or injured they are retired by a team of vets waiting to check the dogs at every checkpoint. Team leaders run the dogs 6 hours then rest them 6 hours. While the dogs sleep at checkpoints, the team leaders pick up the supply drops, spread out hay and blankets for the dogs, prepare their meals, build a fire, set up their own tents, cook their food, eat their meals, try to sleep for at least 2-4 hours, then pack up, clean up, harness the dogs, put on all their booties, and continue on their way. In 20 - 40 degree below zero weather—five layers of clothing on the bottom and nine on top. Or was it the other way around? It didn’t matter. She lost me at 20 below.

            I was taking in all of this information—sort of—nodding my head along with my son, nieces, and the rest of my family. My mother was silently and hilariously aghast as Kim spoke. I could tell what she was thinking: “No siree. Not on your life.” I had to agree. It all seemed to make sense in the same way that bungee jumping makes sense to me—not my cup of tea, but I understood why it would be to some. But still, wow. I raised my hand, “So how many people on each team?” I asked. “One,” Kim answered. “Right,” I said, “Okay, one at a time on the sled, got it. But how many people were on your team? You know, sleeping in shifts, following along side in a snowmobile, waiting at checkpoints or whatever?” “Just me,” she said. “It’s a single person race. In fact, if you accept even so much as a hot cup of coffee from any non-official during the race you’re disqualified.”

            “Wait, what?” I thought. You’re what? All alone? For a week and a half until however long it takes to finish? (30 days for some last place finishers). The look on my face gave her clear delight. “I lost 30 pounds in 10 days,” she said with an impish grin. Woa. I realized that the wind seeping in the little cracks on my cheeks between my goggles and facemask alone would have prevented me from even getting out of New Jersey. I would have had to forego my own food to make room for more toe warmers. Then there were the charging moose, avalanches and blizzards to consider. Nope, not me.

            Kim finished up her story as we stood mesmerized. There was a blizzard and one of her dogs caught hypothermia. Faced with the decision to continue the trail, or travel with her dog by helicopter to the vet hospital, she dropped out of the race. Her dog made it. Now she’s saving up again for her next race. We smiled and thanked her, bought her children’s book based on her story, then she led us outside to take us on our rides. The dogs barked as we approached, clearly excited for the chance to run again. Taking turns sitting and standing on the back of the sled, it was a smooth ride without bumps or potholes. Very calm, completely relaxing. I enjoyed it immensely. Then I remembered the blizzards and the 40 below, the standing for 6 hours at a stretch then 2 hours of sleep a night for weeks. The terrifying solitude and concern for injured dogs. I watched the dog’s shadows on the clean white snow ahead of me dance. I looked at the sun through the trees and thought of the incredible sunsets and breathtaking panorama.

            The dogs slowed as we pulled in. It was my mother’s turn for a ride. “Not me,” I thought, “but I may have just met the bravest woman I am ever likely to meet face to face: Kim Darst.” Certainly the bravest from New Jersey.

The Red Balloon

            Student teaching has been heaven so far. It offers all the enjoyment, fostering and connection to the students without the responsibility of lesson planning, curriculum oversight and the very real burden of statewide testing and district paperwork. But that will change. As I am given more to do this semester, my blithe ride on my mentor or co-operating teacher’s coattails will evolve into the very real demands of being a teacher until, by then end of my final student teaching semester, the responsibility will be mine-all-mine. And the weight of twenty-six little worlds will be on my shoulders. But for now, I am still the student, and it’s pure delight.

            I was placed in a second grade classroom in a public school a few towns away but much like our own here. It’s an inclusion classroom as they will all be one day and the term will have faded away into oblivion.  We teach, accommodate and modify for all manner of learners, because it’s slowly dawning on us as a nation that we do not all learn the same way. Recently, after snack, the lights were dimmed and my ‘co-op’ put on a movie. It was “The Red Balloon”, the original version in muted, sepia-like tones, except for the bright red balloon. And the little girl’s blue balloon—remember her? I hadn’t recalled there being so little dialogue—I had the book as a child—but what dialogue there is, was in French.

            The children were transfixed. Even D, with his cognitive and impulse control challenges sat and watched, mesmerized by the rich images, lush music, and the boy’s adventures. Eventually, the students began to comment aloud and point and giggle at the balloon’s hijinx. Then they had questions. Why is the boy carrying a briefcase? I told them that children carried satchels before there were wheeled book bags and knapsacks. Why are the grownups so mean to the balloon? I sighed. I wanted to say, “Well, kids, this was Paris in the fifties—a time and place populated with adults not known for whimsy,” but I didn’t. They asked why the boy was allowed to walk to school by himself. I laughed out loud. “Children were more independent then,” I said, “they were encouraged to explore their neighborhoods after school as long as they were home for supper.” Then, instinctually, I stopped answering directly and only led them to the answers they were seeking. I coaxed them to imagine what the boy must be saying to the balloon, to imagine what words would have been spoken between them. I asked them the questions. Then I listened as the children created story dialogue for them selves. I led them inside the boy’s world then let go of their hands.

            My co-op was generous to let me have this back and forth with her students as the movie continued. She allowed me to guide them without stopping, editing or adding to what I was saying. I was grateful to her for giving me the opportunity to become a member of the democratic classroom community she’d spent all year carefully creating. I was excited for the chance to tie in what they were watching with the themes they would be exploring in language arts—themes that included narrative story telling, fairytale, fiction, characters, and a sense of place and drama. I encouraged them to notice how music can change the viewer’s mood.

            As the movie neared its heartbreaking conclusion I worried the students might feel the devastation I remembered feeling as a child. Those bullies had upset me so; even their eyes were cruel. I prepared myself for their tears, but the children were all just fine. They were content that the boy was ultimately happy as he reached for the strings of Paris’ myriad balloons and gathered them into a tangled jumble. Perhaps my presence had something to do with the safety they felt as he floated away unmoored. But it’s probably hubris on my part. Kids have seen it all by second grade.           

            The movie ended and my co-op told her students to sit on the rug and close their eyes. She stepped outside into the hall and brought in two large bags of inflated red balloons—twenty-six in all. She gestured for me to take a bag and release the red balloons so that they would cascade down over the children. They opened their eyes as the balloons bounced and filled the room; squeals filled the air. For the children who learn sensorially, emotionally or visually, here was a chance to claim this experience for them selves, to forge their own relationship with a red balloon, to own a story and make it personal. D hugged his to his chest while the boys with ADHD were given full license to bounced theirs atop their heads and slap them into the air. The group learners immediately discussed what to name their balloons, while the solitary learners felt comfortable moving away from the larger group and exploring the possibilities quietly and alone. Everyone was fully present. No one felt shamed, left out or behind.

            It was a moment of pure joy watching these learners internalize on their own terms, then create their own connections to the little French boy’s story the way they chose fit. It was fantastic to see them up out of their chairs and not simply drawing a picture of a red balloon or filling out some worksheet silently at their desks. It was a simple thing but so imaginative on the teacher’s part, to think of a way to imprint a story on a group of children, in a way that makes most sense to them. It was quite magical, I must say, watching the children so full of glee—almost as magical as the story itself.

Enigma

(Verse- Latin)

You veered my way leaned in close.  Our chit-chat touched on morose

Thought out of the box, for an orthodox.  Then you grinned-- Uh, huh

Described you mom’s roast chicken.  I noticed my pulse quicken

Walked me to my car, complained I parked too far.  Then made a joke-- Uh, huh

Are you facetious, or are you serious, or are you kidding or are you both?

(Chorus- Country)

You’re an enigma, wrapped in a Jew

I’m on the outside looking in-- I don’t know what to do

You’re always busy with your sisters, tethered to your mother

Cut the chord, or find another

You called me late, cooed my name.  Confiscated my game.

Said you come around, after sun down.  Then you grinned-- Uh, huh

Your texts today were cunning.  Our repartee’s no-less-than stunning

But you’re slip’ry, keep taunting me.  Can’t nail you down-- Nuh, uh

(Bridge – Country)

I’m totally wrong for you.  You’re apropos for me

Funny and kind.  In that keppie a sharp mind

Our morning was unusual.  But the day was sublime

I’m no baleboostah for you.  You’re apropos for me

But I can’t navigate, our differences of fate

We could start all over.  But I think it’s too late.

(Instrumental)

I’ve lost the shape of your face.  Your pale skin seems out of place

Your fading voice, was not my choice.  Your hard G’s gone-- Uh, huh

You said you liked my moxie.  But-your-commitment’s to-your orth-o-doxy.

I miss our long chats, your black winter hats.  Your dimpled smile-- Uh, huh

You’re so facetious, or are you serious, or were you kidding or are you both?

(repeat chorus – last line x 2)

The Saddest/Silliest Day of the Year

I heard on the radio yesterday that January 6^th was supposed to have been the saddest day of the year-- according to science. Not the science responsible for gravity and school projects on inertia using reclaimed hot wheels cars found under couch cushions, but the “science” with finger-style rabbit ears on either side, responsible for miracle neck creams and weight loss shakes-- especially the strawberry flavored ones that come with a “no exercise” regime. There should be a new branch of scientific research named for these kinds of claims: Goofball Theory, or perhaps, Science for the Heck of It. If I were a journalist or media outlet, I would definitely pick up on a story based on qualitative research data authored by a guy named Cliff. That name just screams no-need-to-fact-check.

As I listened to the broadcast, I discovered that the science was eventually debunked and that the “scientist” was-- get this—a part-time tutor. “Cliff Arnall” if that is his real name, came up with the supposed “research” in 2005-- in cahoots with a travel agency-- in order to motivate sad clowns everywhere to book flights to Palm Springs and cruises to Puerto Vallarta. I wonder what Cliff does with the rest of his time when he isn’t tutoring? Chiropractor/Poet. Or Life Coach/Playlist Advisor. I’d be shocked if he owns a car. I did a little goofball “research” myself—also known as Wikipedia—and discovered that this part-time hoodwinker even had a fake algorithm to go with his flimsy claim.

The algorithm is awesome in that it looks like something that would be on the chalkboard in the background of an episode of Community or South Park. Picture this: (W+D-d)T to the Q power over MN to the little a. It’s factors are weather (W) (Okay, I’ll bite); debt (small d) (I’m still here); time since Christmas (T) (Because “Blue Monday” only afflicts Christians?); and low motivational levels (M) (Of course. The math won’t work without depression factored in). My favorite capitol letter is the Q, which represents “time since failing our New Year’s resolutions” (Hahahahahaha).

That’s hilarious, Cliff. But, why stop there? Why not factor in the number of pine needles I probably missed vacuuming up after taking the tree down and getting it out of the house (P), and divide it by the number of ornaments broken (small o). How about we multiply that baby by the number of different styles, lengths and thicknesses of coats I’ve worn in rotation since the beginning of the Winter Solstice (147) then extrapolate from that the derivative of the number of gift returns I had to make to various shops and malls (R) by the routes I’ve logged the most hours on (22 and 10). How about we compute the absolute value of that, Cliff, by the determinant weight in kilos of guilt I still feel by not having sent out Christmas cards this year (KG), and then put the whole enchilada in parenthesis and multiply that by the number of hours I still spend every day thinking that if I order cards today I can still, maybe, get away with sending them out to my friends as belated Valentines (hV).

I don’t know, Cliff. For a guy who has cajones the size of Rhode Island, I can’t fathom why you stopped short at the saddest day of the year. Why not whip up one of your fancy-schmancy algorithms for the Kookiest Day of the Year? The Pointiest Day of the Year. Or, the infamous, Smelliest Day of the Year. Why don’t you get right on that, Cliff, between tutoring gigs. Deodorant companies are just a phone call away. Meantime I’m going to get on with my life in the world of real science and legit mathematics. I’m going to enjoy the crackle and hiss of wood burning in my fireplace. I’m going to revel in the warmth of my comforter when the air around my ears is still cool in the deep of night and marvel at the magical pixies that fill up my oil tank in the day. I’m going to delight in the reflected light that bounces off a fresh blanket of snow, in through my widows and brightens up the hidden corners of my house that floor lamps can’t reach. And I’m going to be practically giddy that I survived the manic holiday preparations, forced family dinners, and the first winter storm that was barely a smattering when you get right down to it. I’m going to be happy (H) today (T), Cliff (small c), not to spite you and your uptown math, but because I’ve no reason not to be. And this is my simple sciency equation to prove it: (T + J - c = H)