The Family Embrace

This morning, Mike did his usual thing of picking up Seth and carrying him around and petting him. Seth has come to expect that and when Mike is in a hurry, Seth will pace in front of him crying for what we call Pick-Me-Up time. As usual, Mike carried Seth like a football, if a football reached out and put his front paws around Mike's wrist in a hug. Nick and I gathered around them so Seth received love with five hands, six if you count the football clutch.

"Petting, petting, petting," Nick said in a robot voice.

"Too. Much. Petting," Mike said.

I put my hands on Seth without petting him so it wasn't really too much petting. Seth loved when we gathered around him in this family embrace. I used the time to pat Nick on his shoulder and back too. I didn't like bugging a seventeen-year-old for hugs, but he and I both needed the contact. I just had to try to be cool about it. It was almost impossible for me to be cool, but Pick-Me-Up was the perfect time and Nick didn't pull away.

Blitz paced back and forth around us, crying.

What the heck? Blitz hated being picked up, except when it was time for him to eat. I'd been picking him up to hug him and he almost always groaned as I tucked my arm under his butt the way Mike did with Seth. Blitz wouldn't let me roll him over and cradle him like a baby. There was a whole lot of wrestling and clawing going on when I tried to cradle him, so I usually tucked him in like a football. Still, he groaned, accepted it, then wrestled with me to get down when I hugged him too long.

This morning though, Blitz paced and cried.

That cat was so incredibly worried about getting fair treatment, even treatment that he didn't like, especially when he could see Seth reveling in it. Pick me up into the family embrace.

So, I picked him up and tucked him under my arm. Then, while Mike still held and petted Seth, I stood with Blitz and Nick turned to pet him too. The family embrace. This was what we did. Blitz grew up thinking this was how cats were supposed to be treated. I think Blitz would be surprised about how different life might be in another family.

I always thought that fitting in was such a human thing or maybe a dog thing, you know, pack mentality. But I never thought it went further than that.

I was wrong. After watching Blitz, I realized that animals worked to fit in, to do what everybody else was doing. It wouldn't surprise me now, after the Blitz lesson, if you told me that all animals worked to fit in, to do what everyone around them were doing, just so they could feel the family embrace. Their survival might depend on it or maybe it was love. How was I to know?

Thank you for listening, jb

If Your Teachers Were Comedians

I have an interview today for a part-time job that I've been doing for two years now.

Can you believe that I'm nervous?

I volunteer at the school, working with students to help them write. With one guy, I simply used Natalie Goldberg's advice for freewriting to break his writer's block. That's all it took before he didn't need me any more. I worked with that same guy for two years, but the best thing I did for him was to repeat what I said on that first day. Keep your hands moving on the keyboard. Don't correct anything yet. Stay focused for as long as you can and each time you break, take note of how long you kept up the good focus. Then, for subsequent freewrites, try to extend it just a little bit longer until you can write continuously for twenty minutes at a time without stopping. Then, if you have a shitty first draft according to Anne Lamott's good advice, you can run through it word by word and clean it up.

I'm doing a freewrite now. Can you tell?

I do it all the time, sit down and write until I know what it is that I want to say. I hardly ever know what I want to tell you when I sit down to a blank screen. I just keep writing until something pops up. Today, it's a way for me to think about that interview and what I would do differently with students if they let me.

I'm writing about writing again. Do you mind? Wouldn't you rather I write about kittens or dogs playing games? Wouldn't you rather hear something funny?

Me too. I'd rather, but today I have an interview and I'm trying to prepare for it. What if they ask me what my weaknesses are?

I get distracted. I'm not serious enough, but the high school students generally like that even if the staff doesn't. I don't often use the words gerund, preposition, pronoun, conjunction with a student when we're talking about their writing.

Conjunction junction. What's your function?

Are you old enough to remember that?

You know, I'm not sure if there's a deep benefit to learning much besides noun, verb, adjective. I tell my students to read their work aloud, that their minds know when the grammar is correct. Then we talk about 'ain't.' I like to use the word 'vernacular' with them. I get to try my Indiana twang on then.

"Y'all ain't gonna let me ride shotgun, ain't ya?" I say with my best hometown dialect. And any of my students will invariably agree with me that this is not correct grammar. I tell them it's great to use in dialog if they can.

Then, if I'm really on it, I pull out an English accent and say, "But you would most likely smash up the lorry if you were to ride where you might be seen wearing that bloody ugly jumper.'

Then, suddenly they know what 'vernacular' means and I can work them through hearing the grammar, correct and vernacular. Then we can talk about our narrator. Sometimes a whole book is written in the vernacular, I tell them, but they'd better be careful using that for an English teacher. It had better be done in a way that their teachers know it's intentional and not an unfortunate accident that will leave them with a C or a D in class.

You know, I honestly think that the school system should hire smart stand-up comics as teachers. Can you imagine taking that class as you're getting your Masters Degree in Education? Getting and Keeping Students' Attention 101. How to Engage your Reluctant Student through Humor 102.

When you go listen to a stand-up comic, you never look away if she's funny. It doesn't matter if she's talking about how her mother goes on and on about gout while unloading Depends and Exlax chocolate from a grocery bag on a hot day. You're not going to look away. Even though there's just a woman, a microphone, and a footstool hosting a glass of water on the stage. You're not going to look away because you might miss something she does with her face up there. You'd hate it if everybody laughed and you missed it.

Yes, I really believe that that teachers should be able to entertain their students. I think that humor is a challenging but engaging art form. I think that it should be encouraged, that kids making presentations should be told that being funny will keep all eyes and ears on them while they are trying to make a point.

I don't think I should say that in my interview at the school today, do you?

Thank you for listening, jb

Running with the Dogs

Teddy has been really sad during all this kitten stuff. Why is he sitting here waiting to go to the park? Why isn't he the star of the show instead of the ratty little kitten who's afraid of everything?

Teddy's really cute when he sits on top of three blankets and two pillows on the cold leather couch. Teddy's adorable at the dog park when he gets three puppies to grab onto his stick all at the same time. Teddy's awesome when he sees the girl's cross-country team run through the park and he wants to join the girls cross-country team and run with them every day. Teddy loves girls.

Teddy is probably right. He would make a really good dog for a book.

Actually, Teddy was born to be in the movies instead of a book. He's completely photogenic. I get a lot of attention being the ordinary woman who brings him to the park.

"What breed is she?" a girl will ask.

"He's a mix, a shelter dog," I reply.

"Sorry, he. He's so pretty, he looks like a girl. No way, he's a shelter dog? He looks like one of those Korean dogs, a jindo?"

"Nope. Sorry. His mother was an Australian shepherd mix."

"He looks just like a jindo."

Her face isn't as friendly now. Did I hold the line too long?

"Well, you never know," I say, just trying to be nice. I'm not willing to pay $75 to find out what his DNA says he is, but I'd almost guarantee there isn't a bit of jindo in him. How often do you see lab mixes at the park?

And how often do you see jindos?

I had to google 'white korean dog' to even remember what the breed name was. No, the odds are pretty low that Teddy is a jindo mix. Pretty damned low. Most of the dogs out there ranging around and impregnating other dogs are either pit bull or lab mixes. Now and then, you get husky mutt puppies, but not jindos. People with jindos aren't letting them range around the neighborhood, impregnating female dogs.

But what 's the point of arguing with people? It doesn't change their minds. I can feel in the conversation when it begins to make them mad. I don't go past that point. I don't want to be that woman who alienates everyone at the dog park. And then the next time Teddy shows up, these same people don't want to pet him because I was the crabby old woman who told them they were idiots.

No, I want Teddy to be well-loved at the park. So, I nod my head and ask her questions about her dog. I want people to talk to me while we watch Teddy lope along with the other dogs, leaping neatly over a dog who stops abruptly.

So yeah, maybe I will tell you more stories about Teddy. He's quite an unusual dog, even if he doesn't have a drop of jindo blood in his veins.

Later though. Right now, I have to take him to the park so he can run with the dogs.

Thank you for listening, jb

Flying or Riding the Wave

Now and then, I dream I can fly.

It's never easy in those dreams. The best I can do is fly to the treetops and that is with great effort. When I fly, I am a great bird with small wings, never intended for much besides hopping leaps. I'm a turkey, working with every muscle of my body, every single muscle to get off the ground. I wake up sore when I dream I can fly. I'll lie in bed, barely removed from the dream of flight, sweating like a runner.

I feel like that now.

I promised myself that I wouldn't write about writing here, but it's hard not to. I published two books this fall. Marketing my books is complicated and I don't fly easily. I have to work very hard to get into the air. Writing is easy, but marketing is hard. Getting my books airborne takes every bit of muscle in my body and quite a bit of air from my lungs. After readings, I feel as though I've worked out. I'm pretty good at public speaking. I get my audiences to sing then the rest just flows out of me. But it's not just talking in front of people. It's sending queries and press releases and entering contests of dubious value. I want to go back to writing. Writing is more like letting water flow around your knees. It makes me a little wobbly until I let it float me up. I can float forever.

Today, I wondered why I never dream I swim the oceans, the rivers, the lakes. Water is my forte. Ah, yes. I have dreamed I flowed down a river. It was invigorating, crashing, dodging rocks, rolling out of the holes and down the chutes.

I am a sucker for a book with water on the cover. I assume I can swim in those words. Or drown. On Instagram, I follow a photographer of water, Andrew Semark. Just go look at his waves for a little while, just sit with them. Put them on a big screen. Buy prints for your walls. (No, this isn't an advertisement. He has no idea how much I love his photos.) Feel the power and the softness in his waves. I could drown in that softness. I could feel that power.

Water is resolute. If it needs to move, it will move no matter what's in its way, slip through your fingers, fling down trees, carve cliffs, pull a swimmer out to sea. One drop at a time, water changes everything.

"Never underestimate the power of water," Mike once said to the news crew when they interviewed him after a flood dug a twelve foot ditch and piled gravel on the highway six feet thick. I've felt that power. I felt it grab at my ankles as we piled sandbags around that new ditch to save a house and a garage. That water was going to flow. We were lucky we could guide it away from the house. That water rolled concrete blocks down onto the highway. It took three days for the department of transportation to move the pile of rocks after the flood. Never underestimate the water.

Yet, when I'm in the water, I feel so free. My parents called me a waterbug when I was little, a fish. When I was six and saw the ocean for the first time, a wave slapped me out of my father's hands and swirled me back onto the beach. I loved that honest wave. That feeling never left me. Even at fifty-seven, put me into a bathing suit in the water, and I can glide, dive, leap out of the water, and dive back down until I feel the pressure of the water on my eardrums. I am a child again in waves, a leaf in a current, and always that kid with wet shoes after a walk.

Maybe I shouldn't try to fly with my books. Maybe I need to dive deep and swim with them. Maybe I need to find the other fish, dolphins, whales, and urchins instead of trying to connect with birds and stars.

What do you think? Are you a bird flying or a creature of the sea?

I can tell it's past time for me to go to sleep. Dreamy or ridiculous. I can't tell which. But tonight, I want to dream of the depths, to crash into the air then dive back down into the blue, to slap my tail on the surface, to spiral, to flip and roll. I want to feel the softness, the resolution of the water on my soul. I want the water to carry me out, to pull me inexorably along the length of the coast.

I want to ride that wave.

Thank you for listening, jb