Edubabble and other Blither

is almost over, thank god. May has been a clusterfuck for a long time, probably as long as Trip and I have been together. In May, there's the rush of grading, sorting, finishing, scrambling that accompanies the end of the school year. There are the birthdays of two nephews. There's Trip's brother's birthday. His grandmother's birthday. There's Mother's Day. There's Memorial Day. We don't necessarily have events tied to every one of these events, but May seems like an eternity.

Some highlights:

• Brent, Trip's brother who lives in Philly, visited last weekend with his two sons, ages 5 and 2. Brent's wife, Jen, is taking classes and gratefully snatched the opportunity to study, clean, and maybe even bask in her house, alone. Brent's oldest, Lance, had turned 5 a week or so previously, but none of the Dogpatch family were there, so we had another birthday celebration for both him and his father at brother Carlin's house. He received presents. There was a cake. The next day there were more presents at Trip's mother's house. No "birthday" cake, though, thankfully. "No wonder kids today seem so bratty sometimes," Trip quipped. "They've had so many fucking birthday parties that they think they're 15 years old." Food for thought, indeed. Trip and I don't remember having meltdowns ever-- we certainly did, we're sure, but they were too long ago to remember. Our 5 year old nephew and 6 year old niece are still having them. I cannot remember having a tantrum. If I had when I was that old, I'm sure my ass would have been cracked.
• At Carlin's house, a breakthrough occurred, one that we thought we'd never see. Deb handed Trip a napkin and said, "Here, Trip, give this to your father." Trip's dad and Deb were on the deck at the same time, along with his wife. He laughed at one of Deb's jokes, one that some of the younger people had not gotten. She appreciated it. She suggested baking soda for a bug bite that plagued him. Surely Armageddon nears.
• Deb and I went to our fourth Springsteen show and had a great time. Except for me stupidly inserting my atm card into the receipt slot. I hadn't even had one beer at that time. This was in the lobby of a Marriott, and we were helped by the brother of one of my former students. Over a hundred miles away....
• This past week I ran into Dixon, who is now 21, at our watering hole, or post. Trip, the Senora, and I were watching the Pens in the playoffs. Dixon had texted me that he'd be there, asking me to be there, but arrived with his dad and waved vaguely. I was confused at first. Was he drunk when he texted me? Later, though, he came over and updated me on his life. He lives with his girlfriend down the street from us, has quit college after being told he couldn't even reference marijuana in a non-fiction human interest story about an transient hippie, and works at Burger King. He plays his music, writes, and would like to be a philosophy major if he could stomach the thought of finishing college.
• I receive newsletters from the honors program I was a part of in college. They usually contain 8 to 10 articles written by students about various topics. The most recent featured a piece about dressing up by a young man who described himself as a decent student (all A's, he added in parentheses) but not an academic superstar. How can that be? What have we come to in education if straight A's doesn't qualify you as an academic superstar?
• Tonight Trip and I are postbound again, meeting the Senora to watch game 1 of the Stanley Cup. I have discovered I really enjoy watching hockey.

It was a very nice breakfast, the meal I shared with the missionaries. I stopped at a local bakery and picked up cinnamon piestix (devilishly good!) and arrived promptly at 9 am. The compound was a lovely farm situated on the outskirts of town; a breathtaking view awaited outside every window.

I shared the meal in the sunroom with Mr. and Mrs. Missionary, Sis Jane Missionary, Grandpa Missionary, and Student Kayla Missionary. An old dog, a boxer named Baby, napped and snored in front of one of the outside doors, after greeting me and making sure I liked him. I did. The Missionaries served savory quiche, coffecake, and a cranberry-cherry jelly or compote of some sort, delicious. The conversation was quick, witty, pleasant, and varied: funny stories about childhood, the time I kept calling the wrong South American number trying to talk to my aunt when she first ventured into the mission field, favorite teachers, and the antics of MK's. Their son, not present, would probably get along great with my aunt and uncle's middle son, who is said to have enjoyed reading The Anarchist's Cookbook and setting things on fire during his youth.

The Missionaries have quite a different purpose in their ministry than my aunt's family does, it seems. They've built churches, sent deaf-mute children to school, and cooked (without electricity or running water) for dozens of people after traveling long distances to barter at the grocery store, which may or may not have had much that they needed.

Whatever I may have feared yesterday after my conversation with the Mrs., they were happy to have me in their home, and Kayla appears to be a happy, well-adjusted, perhaps a bit rebellious teenager. I still believe that if she said she was molestated on the trip, she probably was, but I must admit that there could indeed be something to the theory that she just doesn't want to go on these trips anymore, and I certainly can understand that.

It came up a few times during breakfast. Jane was sharing a story about traveling, and I remarked that MK's were certainly well-traveled, relating my own cousins' varied excursions. "See, Kayla," Mr. Missionary said, "That's a good thing!" Kayla sighed, and vaguely rolled her eyes.

"My cousins did travel," I explained, "but since their missions term was for four years, they were able to attend just one school all the time except for one year out of five when they were on furlough."

"See, Dad, that's what I want."

The theme of how about you do what you want and I do what I want came up again when I asked Kayla what she had scheduled next year at the high school. Besides Spanish, she had taken weight lifting, looking forward to training for next year's soccer and volleyball seasons. Mr. Missionary good-naturedly chastised her choice, dismissing weight lifting as repetitious and unstimulating.

Mr. Missionary is a good-looking older man, a cross between Dubya and Hugh Heffner-- yes, I do think George W. Bush is a good-looking man. He's intelligent and friendly and annoys his children, as do all parents, at least in my experience. When Jane said that she and her brother were vociferous readers, Mr. M. interjected. "You mean voracious."

"Yeah, that, too, Dad," Jane conceded.

"Ask her." Mr. Missionary jerked his head toward me.

"Oh, I'm not in this," I smiled.

"You can only read vociferously if you're reading aloud," he finished.

The only slightly uncomfortable moment for me came when Mrs. Missionary asked me if I found it hard to be a Christian in today's schools. "No, I really don't," I said. "Our district is pretty conservative." Thankfully the conversation took another course.

No matter how much I expound on my newfound don't-give-a-shit-about-what-others-want-or-expect-from-me, after I said my goodbyes to all and left, arms laden with delectable leftovers, I spent the day wondering and worrying if I took advantage of their hospitality. If I was dishonest. If I was a hypocrite to them and to myself. Should I have declined the invitation, saying something like, "Although your offer is very kind, Mr. and Mrs. Missionary, I must warn you that you don't want me in your house, being a pro-choice liberal Democrat who is in favor of gay marriage. I broke away from organized religion a long time ago and still haven't found way to reconcile with evangelism." We'll see. Jane may friend me on Facebook.

I liked Jane. Like her still. I don't think we'll be close girlfriends, due to location, age, and philosophy, but I think that she. . . is me. She's what I would have been had I gone to a Christian college. She's what I would have been, perhaps, if my parents had stayed together. It could have happened that my dad asked forgiveness for the affair, re-accepted Christ as his Saviour. It could have happened that I simply experimented with the party scene a bit, then moved home to Rust Belt Town after graduation, and married a boy from my church.

It didn't happen, though. There's no point in regretting how things have turned out for me because nothing can be done about it, and I don't regret it. It was interesting, though, to sit at that table this morning between Jane and Kayla Missionary. At one time I had been like Jane, but now I identify more with Kayla, both of us wondering how to reconcile others' beliefs with own without making too many enemies, how to fly under the religious radar.

So tomorrow morning I'm having coffee with the missionaries. Not my aunt and uncle who work to convert South American catholics. These missionaries are the very same ones with the daughter who was allegedly molested on a mission trip, and they made her accompany them on the next one. Those missionaries.

WTF? How did that "happen?" I just had an image of a scene from Say Anything, the one when Diane Cort and Lloyd are at the graduation party, and the class is all surprised to see them together. "He asked me," Diane responds to the classmate who asks the "question." That's pretty much it.

Anything could have happened over the past three weeks and pretty much did.

• Two weeks of pure technological hell, during which a brand new laptop cart with thirty laptops repeatedly tripped breakers throughout the school; the internet filter wouldn't let the kids go to Princess Diana sites; our electronic drop box, Synergy, hated me and my entire team of students....
• And I never recovered my mojo, my momentum, my zeal, my getupandgo....
• And the anniversary of my dad's death came with very little fanfare to my way of thinking. Unfortunately, the mischiseled headstone has not been replaced or repaired....
• And I was blindsided with a smallish avalanche of grief after the day had come and gone and then some....
• And my mom called to tell me that one of my best junior high friends died suddenly. Dee Dee was the one my parents worried about me hanging out with. She told me ridiculous tales of nightclubbing at age 13 (did she think she was Drew Barrymore?), tried to talk me into sleeping with my 8th grade boyfriend, and really just said passive-aggressive things to make me doubt everything about myself for all of 7th and 8th grades....
• And this proved to be great training for later dealings with my mother, who is now feuding one day and family the next with my sister, who has decided that my dad was perfect, perfectly misunderstood, perfectly tragic....
• And principal Stan is leaving to become superintendent at a neighboring school district...
• And the main office secretary is retiring and being replaced with a psycho....
• So our school will most likely fall apart....
• And one of my former students was on Dr. Phil on Wednesday for an eating disorder but I missed it, and Dr. Phil is the only show in the world not on Youtube...
• But one of my colleagues-- ironically enough with an OVEReating disorder, is the only person in the world still using VCR tapes so I might get to see it...
• And my mother-in-law Debra Dee and I are going to see Springsteen for the 4th time, but I'm pretty bummed this time. Last time we went Vic and I were ecstatic over having a buyer for the house and Trip had a job interview. I had hope that he'd be able to leave his horrible job. I should not be surprised, seeing how the sale of the house clunked a bit....
• That now Trip has been laid off from a job he really likes.

And I'm having breakfast with the missionaries. Over a week ago I got a completely unexpected email from Missionary Mom, asking if Trip and I would like to come over for dinner and games some night. That didn't work out because of Mother's Day weekend. I never heard from her until today, asking if I'd like to stop over for a cup of coffee and a visit of an hour or so before her older daughter, a teacher who supposedly wanted to meet me, was to head back from wherever she came from.

I didn't particularly want to do this-- let that be known. Trip doesn't care for games, especially not game playing with a family who supposedly do not believe their daughter who was supposedly molested. I do not care for the missionary concept. I do, however, care for their younger daughter, and I wondered if it had been her idea, this meeting of the minds or clash of the creeds or klatch of the coffees.

I didn't say any of this. I instead said to Missionary Mom, "I'd love to stop over for coffee." She paused. What did that mean? I assume it meant, Oh, fuck, I never thought she'd say yes. It could have meant, Hold on, I'm wiping my ass, you caught me on the toilet or Wait a cotton picking minute, I'm performing CPR. I managed to get directions out of her and we said our goodbyes.

I relayed this story, the short version, to Carlin, Kelly, Trip, and Rick, a former student. "So this is a rather strange breakfast date I've got," I said.

"It's very white of you," offered Rick, whose last name, I might add, is Koslaski, which makes him pretty white.

We all looked at him. "I mean," he said, "that it sounds like something white people get themselves into, like perfect lawns and pyramid schemes."

I think it's the WASP in me more than the white.

And like so many times before, it has stung me.