Sweeping the Yard and Pulling the Sprouts

This is what my mother told me about a family obligation to take care of the yard during the time when she was growing up. The yard of the house was neat and cared for by sweeping leaves, twigs, or anything else from the yard to some other place. I forgot to ask where the other place was. Anyway, in addition to sweeping, everybody in the family understood that they shared a duty to pluck any growing thing that appeared in the ground. A blade of grass stood no chance. The yard was a point of pride.

The swept yard should not be imagined a field of dust. With care, the dirt was compacted by use. The yard usually had a tree and under the shade of tree a family spent time in the yard, the coolest domestic space available during long, hot southern summers. With her usual grace, Sharon Astyk describes the beauty and utility of a living, used packed-earth living space. 

Instead of attempting to grow grass or other ground covers in the hot south often on red clay, rural southerners would sweep and tamp down that clay until it baked hard as a rock, reducing dust tracking and making the space suitable for yard work. Houses, hot during the day, were abandoned and people moved outside to shaded yards where they could do the washing, cook, eat, butcher animals, and do other heavy work in the shade of trees.

I remember as a child our house in the city had a sparse front yard. The yard had patches of growth but it also had bare spots. Two large oak trees shaded the yard and maybe whatever grass the yard had could not compete with the oaks. 

Eventually the front yard was lush with St. Augustine grass. But that's another story.    


 

A search by Goggles

A search by Goggles
Originally uploaded by woodpainter

I love some of the similar images provided by Goggles. Some nice company for the Harrisburg courthouse. I wonder if these buildings are now introduced to each other.

2011-07-04 07.13.09.jpg

2011-07-04 07.13.09.jpg
Originally uploaded by woodpainter

When time passes and the weather gets hot lettuce is bitter and unappetizing. However, lettuce left the summer to go to seed is beautiful. Give lettuce its place and time and add some water and the vegetable returns beauty.

And so we spoke of the unexamined life

I met today with a a summer general education class. I like gen ed classes. They provide the greatest potential for reaching students. They also present challenges when a goodly number of the seats are occupied by students who have a commitment to a strict path to a degree that satisfies a yearning for money or another life desire.

With first-year students a discussion of what could happen to the in four years' residence. For so many students the first year of college is the thirteenth grade, something they do because a college degree is what comes next. Parents think so, friends are on board, somebody told them that a college degree is worth money in the world of work. Do not overlook the prospect of independence and fun.

Ask about any one of the usual reasons, ask if that is what put them here, and one notices a hesitation, as though the student is thinking about the reason for going to college for the first time. In thinking about the usual answers some students exhibit some embarrassment, as though the list is not impressive and even if it is true the reasons are selfish even by today's youth standards.

I will return

While thinking of the Osama photographs

Photographs reveal more than the subject. A photograph always speaks of the intention of the maker or the intention of the subject cooperating with the maker. Alexander Gardner’s Civil War “What Do I Want, John Henry?” speaks volumes on the social attitudes within the Army of Liberation . The decision of Roy Stryker to widely release only one image of the Dorothea Lange Migrant Mother series tells us about a sway from reportage to poignancy. The several views of Che talk to us about the cooperation of the photographer in establishing the fame of the hunters (everybody gets his chance).

So, I do not want so much to see the Osama bin Laden death photographs as I would like to see them and think about what they mean, to see if I recognize an emotion or an illusion. Or maybe myself.

But I am also content to wait for the release. After all, that will not be long. I can see them in the grocery store checkout next week.

Abbetor. Crabb's English Synonymes

It's the conversation, stupid!

At times I reflect on the digital humanities. A transformation is afoot. I ask myself "Just what is it that's going on here?" I don't know. But I get hints. I follow others who find the relatively new world called "digital humanities" a world of interest. We explore and talk to one another. Most of my talk is via Twitter. Some of it is marginalia scribbled in comment boxes of blogs. I listen to others via all of the media available, including digital media.

We digital humanities folks take pride in impressive accomplishments in finding and receiving content in new ways, via new tools.

What occurs to me is that the digital humanities movement is at a moment of conversation. As we converse, we discover. Our communications are pointers. We discover new paths. And we share maps of our journeys.

Is This Use Or Misuse of Media in Art History?

High School PE Taught Me How To Conjugate Verbs. Sort of.

Eleventh grade. A tough one. Acne. So on. Eleventh grade: English and PE classes and other classes I don't remember at the moment. English class was into verb conjugation. PE class was not into exercise because it was my turn for locker room duty--caged room with baskets to hold student stuff.

So. Back to English. We had a book with lots of examples of conjugations. Each example was presented in two columns, one singulars and one plurals. Hour after hour I stared at all the examples and tried to learn the conjugations. Memorizing all the examples was tough. I would stare, close my eyes and try to remember what the conjugations looked like, and then open my eyes to check. I wrote the examples over and over. I was making progress.

But. Test. An English test over these conjugations was coming up. In fact, on the particular day I am remembering the test was later that day.

While protecting the PE baskets I kept pouring over the illustrations and I knew that I was making progress but I also knew that there was no way I was going to get all of those things perfectly remembered.

I decided to stare at the illustrations, close my eyes and try to say the things. I knew that I would have to write the examples on the test, but I was grasping for anything that might help me remember.

Then I experienced one of those moments of enlightenment, one of those moments that comes close to proving that God exists and that God is just. Sort of. As I said the examples I suddenly realized that what I was saying sounded familiar.

I shout
You shout
He shouts

We shout
Y'all shout*
We shout

Damn. This conjugation thing is just a fancy word for how I talk. Everyday. All the time. I tried it out with other verbs. It worked. I looked at the examples in the book. I said the first person singular (another fancy thing) and then I was able to complete the whole example.

Why did nobody tell me that these things, these conjugated words, were nothing more than everyday chat? I had never heard of Molière, but I must have been as astounded and delighted as Jourdain. Without knowing what I was doing I had been conjugating as far back as I could remember. Amazing.

Gym ends. Returned stuff to students. Ate lunch. Took test. Aced it.

*I was reared in the southern United States. We had the advantage of having a regularly used, distinctive second-person plural pronoun.

How to annoy a person with a smart phone

Yesterday. Yes, it was yesterday. Yesterday I was watching a news report about Japan on my Android. All of a sudden the video froze and up popped a message. A message. Typed. "Incoming call."

Nuisance.

Dismissed the call and had to refresh browser to return to the report. Some people just got no consideration.

Massive tsunami devastates Japan - Asia-Pacific - Al Jazeera English

Massive tsunami devastates Japan - Asia-Pacific - Al Jazeera English: "- Sent using Google Toolbar"

Cat sleeping, purring

Cat sleeping
Me watching
Cat shifts
I put my head near
Cat awake
We stare
Cat paw out and touches my nose
Cat purrs

Dream. That is the important thing. Dream to change the world. Dream to end oppression. In a country. In a state. In an office.

James Agee On The Limits of Text

Pannapacker at MLA: Digital Humanities Triumphant? - Brainstorm - The Chronicle of Higher Education

Pannapacker at MLA: Digital Humanities Triumphant? - Brainstorm - The Chronicle of Higher Education: "I wouldn’t worry about community colleges. Although two-year schools sometimes show little interest in theory, they have been ahead of the rest of us in using new technologies, at least in pedagogy."

That is a comment by Henry_Adams on Pannapacker's post in the Chronicle. The comment is right on target. I made the same observation when I was directing a tech center for faculty (some years ago--during that fuzzy time between Web 1 and Web 2). The two-year faculty had pedagogical question but mostly they had questions about how to stretch capabilities of common software--from presentation media to web work. As Blackboard made its appearance at the four-year campus, the community college regulars asked for accounts. I gave permission and even assisted in moving content from their WebCT LMS to our Blackboard system.

The reasons? I find them embedded in the post and the comments. The community college faculty members had teaching as their primary assignment and seemed to like the situation. While my local faculty members found themselves tied to the triad of professional responsibilities, and teaching ranked low at most levels of faculty evaluation, the community college faculty members knew that their evaluations would be linked to good teaching.

However, I do not think that all the two-year faculty members were after points in the academic game. Most of my contacts were with people who liked technology and believed that technology could be an aid in their profession. They were professional teachers.

What I did not do then was to try to find our of our community college transfer students if they brought superior technology skills to our campus--compared to our four-year students. Having skills does not predict student preparedness, but having tech skills that might be higher than our regular junior students does suggest good preparation.

Much of this has changed in recent years. The four-year "mission statement writers" finally discovered that students needed a grounding in those tech skills demanded by the employment market and so insisted that professors include tech skills as part of the expectation for students enrolled in our classes.

And that is the saddest part. The community college experience gave students a grounding in technology as a communication aid. I fear that my four-year institution's demand for tech skills is more directed towards knowing spreadsheets and presentation software and whatever other skills of the moment attach to a major. As most of us interested in a deeper view of technology know, the up-to-date skills of the classroom will be not-so-useful in the world of work.

I find satisfaction with the work I did several years ago. I am also grateful for the examples I saw among community college teachers. Those examples remain an inspiration.

10 Hottest Careers in America - CBS MoneyWatch.com

10 Hottest Careers in America - CBS MoneyWatch.com:

"5. Feature writing on the web. Is this where all those newspaper reporters who lost their jobs will end up?

- Sent using Google Toolbar"

I talked to a colleague who said that submitting the productivity meant that he was being used

The time arrived. I must complete my annual report form telling my university what I did last year that ought to be regarded as meritorious. We faculty members used to refer to the form as the "merit pay form." Not so many years ago faculty members got pay raises based on a chair and/or dean evaluation and ranking of the reports.

I talked to a colleague who said that submitting the productivity meant that he was being used. The university could use his achievements to show itself active without giving him a dime for what he did. The mention of his achievements might even be considered false advertising. Marketing scheme. Interesting.

The Mob. Your Ancestors?

I followed a link to the New York Daily News and discovered a section of the paper devoted to gangster mobs and their activities, including the rubbing sort. The page took me back to my childhood, to the family gathered around the 300 pound Muntz black-and-white TV, watching Eliot Ness gun down thugs weekly. Magically, the thugs returned by the following Saturday.The frightful fun never ended. 

The quite wonderful thing about the section leader today is that Ancestry.com has a header add on the page. Tempting. Yet, what if this placement is intentional beyond click-throughs. If I enter my name and START NOW will one of those grainy smudged faces below pop up as my starter and turn out to be the Great Uncle that nobody would ever talk about?

Resist. That's it. Don't START NOW. Better to read "Suspected Colombo mob scion Michael Persico celebrates release from jail with pizza and pasta." He's relatively young. He could not be the unbespoken Great Uncle.

Muntz, pizza, pasta. Good protection.

No idea who wrote this.

The Children Will Go to School Because the School is Warm...

The weatherman predicted freezing temperatures for the region, a swath of land in the impoverished black-belt. My friend teaches in a consolidated school for the region. He said to me, "We will have a full house tomorrow; the school is warm; and the students will get something to eat."

I Would Miss Saturday Postal Service

I love getting mail at home. Always have. Saturday deliveries are special. I am at home most Saturdays and hear the mailbox rattling and know that the mail is waiting. Sometimes I work in the yard when the postal person comes with the mail. I've yet to see a grumpy carrier. I take the mail and we exchange a few words about the weather, about the sudden increase in catalogs (November and December), and notification that the carrier will be on vacation next week. The US Postal Service is the closest I come to the federal government and the meeting is usually pleasant. If only the rest of the government would aspire to behave as does the USPS. 

I know. Nixon or somebody axed the postal service from the government. Never mind. The service is still a government service to my mind; just as Benjamin Franklin intended. By the way, Franklin proposed a seven-day postal delivery service.