5/31: swapping
...the gendered words in Elsie Finnimore Buckley's story of Echo and Narcissus. I was following the model of Gender Swapped Greek Myths by Jonathan Plackett and Karrie Fransman, a book whose experimental bent I appreciate. The point isn't to suggest that the gender swapped versions are "better" or are "rectifications" of historical injustices--instead, they are invitations to noticing and thinking about one's own perceptions and reactions. I definitely felt that Plackett and Fransman's book was a kind of mirror as I read it. And I felt the mirror effect in a different way when I went through a story word by word and did the swapping myself.
5/30: sending a note
...to the students who are continuing in Latin next year. I passed along the free PDF of Cloelia: Puella Romana plus some extra notes I made for/about it earlier this week. A few students always ask if there's something they can do to work on their Latin over the summer, and I usually point them to Ritchie's Fabulae Faciles, but it has some things that we haven't learned in the first year. Cloelia is easier and shorter so would be less taxing over the summer, and I feel good about having spent the time getting to know it and writing the extra notes. Now it's ready to be sent out in future years too.
5/27: heading out
...to Woolly Hollow in the morning. It was too hot to walk even early, so Woolly Hollow--with its cascade (thanks to recent rains) and shade--was a good option. Chris came too! We saw a snake (same snake but spotted by each of us at a different time), and Chris made a great video of some bugs walking with a rotating leader. I, of course, photographed the water. It was good to venture out of the daily pattern a little.
5/26: a small glass
...of fresh orange juice. During the school year I fell out of the habit of juicing an orange each morning, but I'd like to get back into the practice for the summer.
5/24: moving the tree
I didn't really move a tree. But I made a choice about formatting a pamphlet, changing where I put the text on the page. When I remember that I can make that kind of choice and that it solves a problem, I think of Lily Briscoe in Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse and how she realizes she can move a tree in her painting. It's the part of To the Lighthouse that has stuck with me most since I first read it in 1986 or so.
5/22: extending
...my reading this morning since both Emma and Phineas were curled up with (and somewhat on) me.
5/21: putting together
...a little found poem by remixing a page from The Wind in the Willows--and then spending some time working on a pamphlet format for it.
5/19: making
...peanut butter pie. And I spread a layer of jelly on the graham cracker shell before I put in the filling, so it's a peanut butter and jelly pie.
5/18: calming my mind
...with colors. This morning on my walk--greens, yellows, blues. And again this evening as I clipped yellows, oranges, purples, blues, and greens for grid collages.
5/15: finishing
...a draft of an end-of-year bureaucratic report. It took several hours, but at least I can close the day with a complete draft. (And hopefully when I look at it tomorrow it won't seem like it needs a lot of revision.)
5/7: working from home
...today. I was glad I was able to, since I needed some uninterrupted grading time.
5/6: reflecting
...a little on the school year. I did some quiet writing while a student was taking a make-up exam.
5/5: writing a business letter
...this afternoon. I knew it would be something that I'd have to be deliberate about, so I had set aside the afternoon and evening for it, but I managed to finish it before dinner. That meant I could do some sweeping this evening.
5/4: remembering
...that the mulberry tree on campus had some ripe berries and that I meant to use that as a good thing earlier this week (but forgot). After dinner I had to get something at my school office, and I walked over to the mulberry tree to pick a berry so it could be a good thing for today instead.
5/3: reading
...the Myth students' lists of 3 things they especially enjoyed about the course. It was heartening, and some of the comments were especially wonderful.
5/2: quietly printing
...my Myth students' final assignments so I don't have to read them on the screen. They amount to quite a stack!
5/1: getting
...24 small bags of chips plus a pallet of 24 individually wrapped blueberry muffins with this semester's "free" dining dollars. It doesn't use up my allowance, but at least I didn't let go as much to waste as last semester.
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