Yes, No, Maybe So??????

“SCRAAAAAPE.  PHISH PHISH PHISH.  WEREREREREISSHSHH.  SCCCRAAAAAAAAAPE…”

These were the sounds I awoke to last Thursday morning.  Yawning, I reached for my cell phone to check the time.   8:15 am.  Who was outside?  And why had they chosen to wake me up, in my opinion, waaaay too early, on my precious vacation day?  “SCREEEEEEEEEEEEPE.”  I threw on my slippers and padded down into the kitchen, where I saw a sight I had never sighted before and never wish to sight ever again.

A small, wiry figure was shoveling snow off of our mostly-already-shoveled driveway.  The hunched-over figure was wearing an old-lady scarf around her head and a hideously enveloping faded-plum colored winter coat.  Black clogs stuck out the bottom of the all-encompassing coat, which had to come from the 1980s or earlier.  Stringy grey-black hair peeked from under the scarf.  It was clear in spite of the coat that the individual in question couldn’t have weighed more than 85 pounds.  Mrs. Figg, the Squib from Harry Potter, was the first thought that flitted through my sleepy mind.  My eyes widened as I realized who was actually shoveling my driveway. 

“Janette—she’s literally going to keel over and die.  And it will be on OUR PROPERTY!”  (Janette found this amusing.  I was half serious.)

The mysterious snow-shoveler is an old professor of mine from my undergraduate days.  Now that I’m working at my alma mater once more, we have renewed communications.  This particular professor has been working for the school since, I don’t know, 1872, and looks older than that.  Her husband has also been at the school an equal length of time, and their years, added together, take us back to the early days of our great nation.  A month ago I, perhaps foolishly, volunteered the downstairs of our little red house to one of her classes for a finals-week Christmas party.  A party that was supposed to start at 10:45…not 8:15. 

This professor has worked 18 hour days for as long as she’s been at school and had been predicted by most to die mid-sentence during a lecture.  Apparently preparing for this party meant arriving close to three hours early.  Janette convinced me to let her shovel in peace, as the driveway really didn’t need it and her OCD shouldn’t spoil my morning off.  The doorbell rang close to 9 as she greeted me with an all-knowing smirk: “Well, I just got done shoveling your driveway.”  (This should be translated: “I shoveled your driveway because you weren’t up early enough and didn’t have enough foresight to take care of it already so somebody obviously had to do it and woe is me, an old woman, whom the job fell upon.”)  Refusing to give her the satisfaction, I informed her that we had been planning on shoveling (re-shoveling…) closer to when the students would arrive.  This merited no response.  After unloading mountains of food from her trunk, I watched and attempted to help her as she took over our downstairs, rearranged our furniture, and sent us on hunting expeditions for tablecloths and extra napkins.  The food that I cooked for the party, at her previous insistence, was put in the oven.  (VWH mysteriously disappeared within 10 minutes of her entry.  He is VW indeed.)  Again, keep in mind that all she originally asked for was our living room.   I had two alumni friends visiting as well, and by the time the party wrapped up after 2 in the afternoon, our respective wills to live had been completely sucked out.

I have written before about power struggles between me and my mother regarding cleanliness and organization in the house.  The next time my mom hosts a gathering and asks me for help, I will gladly offer it, thankful in my heart that all I have to do is set the table and vacuum.  She is absolutely tame compared to what I endured last week. 

I thought I had learned to say ‘no’ after a semi-breakdown following my junior year in college.  I started to figure out that A: the world could go on without me, B: it was OK not to do everything, and C: I’m a much nicer person when I get enough sleep at night.  I continued these improved habits through graduate school, but they have slipped drastically in the past month or so.  They should invent some kind of dog collar for humans that zaps you if you are getting ready to agree to something stupid. 

“Can you play piano for the early service in church tomorrow for free?  You can sight-read all the stuff, right?” 

“Well…I suppose I cou--<BRRRRZAAAAAAAAAPP>--YEEEEEEEOOOOOOWWW!  I’m dreadfully sorry but I’m afraid not this time.”

It’d be Jiminy Cricket taken to a whole new level…Jiminy Cricket combined with Stanley Milgram.

(...The height of irony: my phone just rang with a potential part-time job offer that pays diddly-squat, but would be a neat musical opportunity.  AND I DIDN’T SAY YES RIGHT AWAY.  I didn’t say no either, but that’s progress, right?)

Speaking of which...

I think they must have read my blog:

http://www.newsweek.com/2010/12/02/books-amish-romance-novels.html.

I don’t necessarily hold to the opinions of this article, but I find it curious that it was published only 3 days after my original post.  Apparently 'those dirty Amish books' are becoming more and more popular with the public at large.  More popular equals more money.  VWH is really on to something…  ;)

Oh the weather outside is frightful...

It’s SNOWING!  This morning I left the house and it was raining cats and dogs for the second day in a row.  Unfortunately, it was 20 degrees colder outside this morning compared with yesterday.  Needless to say, it was a pretty miserable drive and walk to work.  The rain switched over to snow around 9am and there are already snowplows and shovels emerging outside our building.  I can’t help but have a big, goofy grin on my face.  I know I’ll be sick of it in a few months (maybe not even that long), but right now it’s a beautiful sight.  Snow in NC was a rarity and when it did come, we had no property on which to enjoy it.    

It feels much more like the Christmas season when it’s snowing outside too.  North Carolinian Christmases were kind of lame.  VWH and I bought a very small, very fake tree from WalMart and set it up in our living area.  (I can’t really call it a room…)  We had a few ornaments and eventually placed some gifts and Christmas cards we received underneath.  It was fine.  But it wasn’t really Christmas.  Christmas means family and wonderful music and homemade cookies and game nights and SNOW.

Remember when you were little and waking up on Christmas morning was the most incredible feeling in the world?  Remember when you couldn’t wait to rip into your gifts and see what awesome stuff you got?  My overriding Christmas-morning emotion as an oldest child consisted largely of impatience.  Waiting to head downstairs took an eternity because Mom and Dad insisted on taking our picture beforehand, and then went ahead into the living room so they could capture our expressions when we saw the tree.  (The longer this took the less happy we looked at the other end.)  Then, once we finally made it downstairs we had to endure the yearly discussion as to whether we were going to open gifts first or eat breakfast.  Dad always wanted food first and the rest of us responded by saying, essentially, “Are you NUTS?!?  There are presents to open and you want to linger over the breakfast table?”  This group included my mother and also our dog.

By the time we convinced Dad, once again, that breakfast could wait and the presents absolutely could NOT, we launched into phase 3.  Phase 3 can be subtitled, “Oh boy!  Let’s open one gift at a time and take delight in each person’s individual happiness.”  When I was but a wee tyke, phase 3 proved to be very impractical.  I would assist in expediting the process by ‘helping’ my younger brothers with their gifts.  Seriously, if you're still too young to control your drool, you’re probably not going to be able to unwrap your new Tonka truck.  This reasoning was frowned upon by my parents, and we have a few too many Christmas video tapes illustrating my abundance of…excitement…in sharing the Christmas spirit with my brothers.  (In my defense, they didn’t seem to care too much.)

By the time we finished unwrapping gifts (“MO-OOOMM…you got me underwear again?!?”) and had our picture taken a zillion times and hugged everybody 5 times over we were pooped.  In hindsight, Mom and Dad must have been absolutely exhausted…and it wasn’t even 10AM yet.  We eventually got around to eating the delicious Christmas breakfast Mom made, satisfying my dad, who is patience personified.  Then we gathered as much of our new stuff as we were permitted and piled into the van for Christmas #2 at the grandparents’ abode. 

It’s funny how things change.  It’s still all well and good to receive nice presents for Christmas.  A small part of the excitement in getting new things remains when I awaken on Christmas morn.  But most of the joy I experience now is reflected in the faces of my family and friends.  It really is better to give then to receive.  And if you are too young to understand that now, give it some time.  You might come around yet.  If not, let’s at least all agree that the white, fluffy snow helps promote the festivities.  J

Girly girls vs. manly men

Two entries in one day you ask? This only illustrates the sheer volume of scintillating tasks that must be accomplished this afternoon.  I spent the hour before lunch folding hundreds of letters into perfect thirds. 

The other reason I thought I’d update is because I actually have an update!  The Pittsburgh-Buffalo game was this past Sunday and it was a doozy.  The week leading up to actual event was most enjoyable, as I taunted and teased my VWH and the in-laws about the impending blow-out.  This was probably a bad idea for several reasons:

1)    Pittsburgh tends to play at the level of whatever team they play.

2)    Buffalo had a two-game winning streak.  Now, granted, they were the only two games they’ve won, but it was still a streak of sorts.

3)    We were watching the game AT the in-laws’ house.

4)    They had food there that I wanted to eat.

And the most important reason:

5)    There was a bridal shower going on for my future sister-in-law during the game and I really wasn’t supposed to be watching football at all.

My brain worked overtime all weekend in an effort to sort out my priorities.  It was like a day from my college Philosophical Ethics class.  Pros and cons.  Deontology vs. utilitarianism.

Pros to watching the game:

1)    It’s a match-up we only get once every four years.

2)    I had hyped it up to the point where going to the shower instead was going to be embarrassing.

3)    We were originally supposed to GO to the game and that didn’t happen.

4)    The game started at 1 and the shower at 3 so I would only miss a little bit of the shower.  And hopefully it would be such a blow-out that it wouldn’t even be an issue.  I mean, comon’, it’s Pittsburgh!

5)    My manly in-laws would think I was cool.  (This actually proved to be true.)

Pros for attending the shower:

1)    It’s the only shower my future sis-in-law was ever going to have that I could attend.

2)    They changed the date so I could be there.  (Yeah…that’s a tough one to get around.)

3)    Every time I’ve watched Pittsburgh play on TV this year they’ve lost.

4)    The game started at 1 and the shower at 3 so I would only miss a little bit of the game.  And hopefully it would be such a blow-out that it wouldn’t even be an issue.  I mean, comon’, it’s Pittsburgh!

5)    My womanly in-laws would think I was cool.

The game started and the first half was everything I could have hoped for.  Pittsburgh led at the half 13-0 and controlled the ball for 24 minutes (out of 30).  We were dominating.  It was ugly.  It was sweet. 

Then the “law-of-arrogance” kicked in the third quarter.  The Bills got a field goal.  Then a touchdown.  Then Buffalo decided to tie the game precisely at 3PM.  It’s like they KNEW what I was going through.  As I watched aunts, grandmas, and cousins pull into the driveway (one especially elderly aunt backed right into a sturdy maple tree) I was torn in half.  What to do?  Why did it have to come down to this?

Still convincing myself that the game would be over soon I opted for football.  Well, those stinkin’ Bills had to send it to overtime.  (Really, the Steelers were looking pretty dismal…we’re lucky we pushed it that far.)  The NFL plays sudden-death overtime, which usually means it’s over quickly.  But this was no ordinary overtime.  This overtime consisted of several drives, back and forth.  There were fumbles at the ½ yard line and dropped catches that would have easily ended the growing misery. 

You can probably guess where this is headed.  By the time Pittsburgh finally scrapped together a drive ending in the game-winning field goal it was well after 4:30.  I let out a quick whoop and immediately left the bedroom just in time to see the aunts, grandmas, and cousins pulling out of the driveway.  Wrapping paper littered the floor of the living room and almost all the food was gone.  This was perhaps the worst way things could have ended for me: Pittsburgh wins the game but we really didn’t deserve to.  Bragging rights have been severely minimized.  And yet I still missed the entire shower, leaving my sister-in-law-to-be (SILTB?) less than happy with me.  (I don’t know this for sure, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t the smoothest move.) 

I feel bad.  Things didn’t turn out the way they were supposed to.  If I had to go back and do it again I would choose differently.  Obviously, the moral of this story is: don’t schedule bridal events during football games.  I’m sure VWH will feel the same way when, in a few weeks, he’ll be the best man at the wedding, wishing he knew the score to the Bills game.

Pizza pizza daddio.

Good morning.  In an effort to avoid the computer EATING my blood, sweat, and tears toiling over blog entries, I’ve decided to type them up in a Word document and then copy/paste.  The real advantage of this is that I get to choose wacky, fun fonts that spark my imagination.  My current choice makes me appear as a 5^th grade male failing penmanship class.

Yesterday I worked on my entry off and on during the morning and then posted it shortly after lunch.  Today I may not make it that long as I am out of work and only one hour has passed.  Yesterday’s busyness was due to a number of student visits.  Among them was my brother-in-law.  He is the youngest guy in VWH’s family and, perhaps, the cleverest.  His reading choices, like VWH, include nutritional choices like Ovid, Socrates, and GK Chesterton.  My youngest brother’s literary sources around that age were more along the lines of “Big Noisy Truck Magazine,” “Cymbals and Other Noise-Makers of All Sizes,” and, if he was feeling especially sophisticated, “Calvin and Hobbes.”  So needless to say, brother-in-law made a very good impression yesterday at his admissions interview.  He really hopes to attend CS Lewis College in Massachusetts, a new institution opening in the fall of 2012.  I think he and VWH have visions of symposiums in dark, wooden rooms with pints of ale, pipes, and long academic robes.  They would do that now if it were the least bit socially acceptable.  However, since my mother-in-law works here too and gets free tuition it will be difficult for him to afford such an establishment.  If he did figure out a way to go, I’m sure all of his brothers would live vicariously through his experience.

It’s hard to feel Oxfordian when your font looks nothing of England or even adulthood.

I don’t usually feel Oxfordian anyway.  While my literary choices at the age of 17 did not include comic books, they also didn’t usually include manuscripts in foreign languages.  I liked to think that I read fairly advanced books for my age until I met VWH.  All of the sudden, if I hadn’t read the Brothers Karamazov in elementary school I was behind the times.  I thought I was a good reader when I was little—I got my name in the newspaper for being one of a very few individuals to finish the local library’s summer reading program.  (Don’t even get me started about what it was like to get the stomach flu and miss the end-of-summer pizza party.)  Apparently the VWH’s family had some kind of accelerated reading program in their elementary school.  Each subsequent brother set the new world record for that program, blowing the previous one out of the water.  This led to such accolades as designing your own school day, newspaper interviews, and visiting international dignitaries. 

VWH assures me that I am smart and make him a better person.  Then he sticks his nose back into the Illiad in the original Greek.  (You think I’m joking.) 

I take my revenge in the kitchen.  VWH may be able to take his Greek Bible to church and keep up with the rest of us and our plain ol’ NIVs, but his culinary successes are minimal.  Pizza dough is his downfall.  VWH loves pizza.  He would prefer to wearing a toga in the reclining position (again, you think I’m kidding), but he would still take pizza over the more authentic dates, honey, and pita bread.

VWH has attempted pizza dough on those days when I was either very late returning from the long day’s work (hee hee) or too tired to make something that time-consuming.  The results have been mixed.  To his credit, a couple of times it’s worked out just fine, but interspersed with the successes are batches of hard, clumpy mess or watery, unrisen goop.  These failed attempts, combined with questions like “how do you use this can opener?” encourage me and give me hope that my contributions DO matter to our marriage.  I may not know ancient languages, but I can open a can, daggone it!

Permissum nos planto pizza!

(VWH says it should be translated “pittam facemus.”  So much for my translation skills.)

The busy season is upon us. No, wait…strike that.

Ahh, Thanksgiving has passed.  Christmas is coming.  The hustle and bustle of the season—the mad rush in stores for bargain shopping, the decorating and baking, the family gatherings.  What delightful images on which to dwell.

…as I sit at my desk. 

Yes, that time of year so often crazed and crammed for the normal person is shaping up to be rather lacking here at work.  The “busy” season apparently ends in early November, leaving in its wake a quiet, lazy atmosphere.  This is all well and good if you’re quiet and lazy.  I hope not to be lumped in either of those categories.

I chatted with the VWH on the journey back from Thanksgiving celebrations and he offered the most unlikely of suggestions for an activity to fill my time.  I was expecting something along the lines of, “learn a new language,” or “improve your vocabulary,” or even “learn all the Bach cantatas aurally.”  His answer?  Write a Christian romance novel. 

You have to understand that the aforementioned books are the subject of much ridicule in our household.  My brother refers to them as “those dirty Amish books.”  He further clarified that the mere notion of kissing before the wedding day makes them evil…to which my Mennonite-raised grandmother retorted, “You think that’s dirty?  Haven’t you ever heard of bundling?!?” 

Those dirty Amish books have been the source of many jokes in my family.  The same brother came up with a number of Amish soap opera titles to reflect their dramatic effect.  These include and are not limited to:

As the Buggy Wheel Turns

General One-Room Schoolhouse

Guiding Gas-lit Lantern

All My Children (that one needed no editing)

The Young and the Pacifists

So when VWH, with all seriousness, informed me that this would be a beneficial way to pass the time, I immediately jumped to the following conclusions:

1.       VWH has no faith whatsoever in my intelligence.

2.       VWH had a wee bit too much food and beverage on Thanksgiving.

3.       VWH finally realized that if we pursue something other than music  performance we might actually make some money.

Turns out that number 3 was the closest.  “At the very least, you spend a few hours doodling around with some ideas and never come back to it.  At the very most, Zondervan publishes it and you make thousands of dollars!”  He has a point…

Still, it’s a compromise.  I mean, the last book I read of the Christian novel genre opened with the text message, “Emergency, Parker!  Come quickly!”  Seriously…when it’s an emergency, who uses capitalization and commas?

But I don’t intend this to be a bitter diatribe against all Christian novelists.  I shed me some good tears over quite a few of those books during my growing-up years, and I don’t mind saying that the average declaration of love in "Waiting for Love’s  Deliverance" (made-up title) is probably much easier for mothers of such weepy adolescent girls to swallow.  It’s just writing chapters and chapters of it that makes my head spin.

“Rebekah flew by Luke in a rage of unrequited love.  How could he ask Rachel home from the singing bee in his new, shiny buggy after all they had been through?  She collapsed in a heap under the largest maple tree beyond the eastern corn field and sobbed until her tears were gone.  Then, after splashing cool water on her face from the brook, she readjusted her apron and returned to the Yoder farmhouse, where she threw herself into canning tomatoes with her five sisters, Mary, Martha, Deborah, Elizabeth, and Dorcas.”

As you can see, I’m apparently a natural.

The eve of Thanksgiving eve

Dear Blog,

I just wrote a very forced, not very good entry and the computer ate it up.  I am not happy.