"Are you a Dad?" and other Stories from Summer Camp

image credit: remarkk

    While working at a summer camp in Louisiana when I was a Benedictine Brother, I got stuck with the task of dealing with children who suffered from homesickness. We called them the homesick kids; it was easy to spot them right away: either they feigned a fall on the first day to get a ticket back home or they showed up at the cabin with a look in their eye of sheer sadness. These were the kids who figured out they were duped. Mom and dad were not coming back. It was not too hard to find these kids for they usually found you! It didn't matter to any of the forlorn boys who made it out to the homesick bay, if I said, "it's only one week." A week could be a month or a million years. They wanted to go home. One night I was in the infirmary and the youngest cabins were about to finish their night swim and I was helping the nurse administer the last rounds of Paxil, Sudofed, insulin shots, band aids and Calamine lotion.

Memento: When I Was a Benedictine Postulant

A page from my scrapbook that dates from circa 2002

My Life Circa 2002

Taken from a page of my scrapbook dated circa 2002 — I had just entered the monastery of Saint Joseph Abbey as a postulant. I was about twenty-two years old (freshly graduated from college). I had started my scrapbook as a seminary college student. The page in this scrapbook marks a special time in my life. It was a time where I had an enormous amount of free time (ironically, since I was living in a monastery). A postulant is someone who has requested to be a novice in a monastery. It is the waiting period between "moving in" and being officially sworn in as a new member of the community.

In the Summer I Joined the Novitiate

After a few weeks of postulancy, the novitiate begins. That lasts for a year, after which the novice petitions the community to take the first set of monastic vows. During this time, the community of monks which I belonged to had voted on a new Abbot. His name was Justin.

An Explanation of the Pages Of My Scrapbook

On the left side of the book is the card that I had saved from Abbot Justin's installation as abbot of the community. I had written in the space below the holy card, "Justin Gerald Brown's Abbatial Blessing". On the facing page is a card that I had kept when I was a postulant. My name (as it is now) was "Greig". On the top is a postcard of a boy sitting amongst a hilly field accompanied by two pigs. My memory is hazy but I think I had picked up this postcard when I had been a student at the American College of Louvain in Belgium — I guess I placed it in the scrapbook as a memento.

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Essay: How to be Generative Without Having Kids

Learn how my Uncle gave me his set of matchbox cars to me when I was young and how this influenced my understanding of passing something down from one generation to the next.

image credit: Tilt-Shift Photography

   When I was a boy my uncle gave me his complete set of diecast matchbox cars.

   There is a photograph of me as a toddler hanging on to our family coffee table, grinning in the flashlight of the camera’s aim, illuminated – darkening the background where you can see strewn on the carpet a multitudinous display of diecast cars. Not only did my uncle give me his entire set of matchbox cars but he and my aunt would take me on Saturdays to the flea market to scout out hidden diecast cars buried underneath piles and piles of junk. I was especially in love with the Matchbox brand, which started out in England as the Lesney company in the 1940s as a cheap way to sell toys to children during the war. I had Hot Wheels too. And I liked Corgi's models. But, my heart, in the end, was stuck on Matchbox.

    Visiting the flea market was a big deal. My aunt sold fashion for porcelain dolls. When she and my uncle frequented the flea market stalls, they were looking for deals on doll fashions. My aunt instructed me on the first day I tagged along to help them pick out fabrics. "Don't touch anything," she told me. She put her arms behind her back and turned around to show me, saying, "this is how you walk. Hold on to your arm so you can catch it if it tries to grab something on the shelf." She was right. The flea market stalls were filled with items that screamed "tangible!" The musty smelling curtains and chain-smoking clerks, ogling collectors handling precious prints of Andy Warhol Marilyn Monroe's and 1950s Hugh Hefner Playboys were for me, a boy's wonderland. I obeyed my aunt, though, and tried not to touch. Besides, I had no interest in handling thin veined china or opaque Depression-era glass. I wanted the toys. While my aunt and uncle felt and measured lacy fabrics, I would look for cigar boxes and glass cases filled with diecast cars, hoping to find the prized Matchbox models that would add to my collection.

Childhood Memory: When I Got My First Bicycle

In this post, I recount my memory of my first bike using a prose style of poem-writing.

My Schwinn was bright green, with a streak of black across its aluminum frame; it had five speeds that I could control from the handlebars, and an orange reflector on the back, a pedal-operated light on the handrest that would glow with fierce intensity through the night.

"Bike Agrowing"

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Nazdrave: A Tale of One Guy's Moving to New York City

Ersatz Warhol prints adorn the wall.
     The house is cluttered with cookbooks and vinyl records. The sparest space is my room. The boxes I had mailed on Wednesday from the Uptown Station sit atop the bureau. “Yer gonna have to give Tony a bottle of Vodka for him hauling your stuff up here. Joking. Joking.” I am given the grand tour, given my keys, sign my rental contract, and within minutes we’re eating olives, goat cheese and downing shots of Johnnie Walker. Tony pours me a whiskey with one cube of ice. He stares into my eyes for a few seconds revealing a boyish character that I know I will come to love. “Nazdrave,” he says, and I repeat, “Nazdrave,” quickly learning the Bulgarian toast. I had said the German prost, but he politely informs me that in Bulgarian prost is derogatory. He clinks my glass a little bit too roughly. “You’re going to break the damn glass, Tony,” Becca says. “It’s good. Becca. It’s good.” Lonnie stands against the refrigerator. We’re changing places. I’m the new roomie. He looks me up and down, sizing me up, to make sure I am a decent enough replacement for the 8 X 11 I’ll be inhabiting.
     “So, you’re a teacher, huh?” I nod and mention something about English. Absorption mode is what I call my mental state at this point. Chrissy and her sister had just left. We ate a Reuben on the steps of the branch of the Queens library. They saw my room. “Good luck, Greig.” “Thanks,” I said. “I’ll need it.” I am comforted my name is printed in stencil beneath the doorbell. "Roselli." Words gather like dust. I memorize what I think I’ll need later. “Brave. He’s brave.” “Buy a month Metro card and don’t lose it.” “This is his first day. July first. 2010.” “Don’t let ‘em knock you down.” “You’re family.” “If you lose your keys, you’re locked out.” “Whatcha gonna do?” “Find out for yourself.” “Maybe you can water the plants when we’re gone.” “You live in Queens but you’re a New Yorker.” “Nazdrave.” We sit around the kitchen table and talk about why the W line has been discontinued. Lonnie says goodbye. I stand up to shake his hand. “I gotta go see my sister in Brooklyn,” he says, his accent a deep Long Island tone. Tony offers another toast. The two men hug. Becca hugs Lonnie. We shake hands again. He gulps the last of his Johnnie Walker, grabs a mouthful of cashews. “Lonnie, we’ll keep your stuff here. No problem. Keep in touch.” Becca straightens her hair. Tony pours me another drink. “If you don’t want any, Greig, just tell him. He’s like a little kid.” I feel like I am living in my head even though I am surrounded by people. I am not used to this at all. I ask to be excused. In the bathroom, I look at my section of the medicine cabinet. A subway map bathroom curtain attracts my attention. I find our stop. I look in the mirror. “Is this real?” I ask my reflection. My reflection laughs. I smile. I am a New Yorker now. 
     I tuck in my shirt and join the fray. Donovan walks in, the other roommate, donning what appears to be a seersucker suit. After introductions, Tony pours him a drink too. “Nazdrave.” Glasses clink. “Goddammit, Tony, don’t break the fucking glass.”

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Feeling Strangely Rental: A Memoir of a Last Month Lease

Dorothea Lange, "Migrant Mother"

In the 1930 Census, there is a ton of data about how Americans lived during the Great Depression.
     Few people had radios in their homes and most middle-class citizens rented. My maternal grandmother grew up in a house on Ursulines in New Orleans and her family paid sixteen dollars a month for the rent.
       Today, renting is not so run-of-the-mill, at least, from my perspective. Two of my friends bought in the last several months, one a thirty-something with a professional job and the other, a couple, who bought a house after renting for thirty-five years. Wow.
       I used to joke that I would never own. Who wants to cut grass? I am not really keen on mortgage notes. If I can't pay the bill I rather be evicted than post foreclosure.

Renting is the only vestige link I have to my ancestors.
Is that the real reason I rent?
Nah.
I decided to rent long before I knew Grandma lived in a rental and didn't have a radio.
     Renting is the only Bohemian side to my pretty complacent, post-MA existence. Renting says, "Hey! I am free, sort of. I may have tons of student loans to pay off but at least you're not going to take my house (because I don't have one!).
     There are obvious downsides to renting. The landlord is number one. Most complaints by renters can be traced back to the landlord. She doesn't fix the leak. He never installed that new water heater. Ya da ya da ya da.

There's more.
     Like, have you ever had your landlord walk in on you naked (yep, that's me)? What about when you are leaving an apartment, have you ever had embarrassing moments with what I like to call the prospective-tenant-old-tenant-landlord triangle?

It goes like this.
     Your lease is up. You got a raise. So you decide to take a bite out of the icing and do a "moving on up" gig. You get a better crib.
     Your last paying month is rather raunchy. You know you have thirty days. So you pack up slowly. You think you have all the time in the world.
     The landlord leaves a message that he's showing the apartment. Cool. You haven't stepped outside all day, so you take a walk to the local coffee shop. That day goes by fine. You are a little creeped out that the prospective tenant may be sizing up YOU rather than the PLACE, but you never met them, so who cares.
     It's a little worse, though, when the prospective tenant, you, and the landlord meet up despite your best attempts at preventative medicine.
     The door knocks. It's your landlord with a twenty-something wanting to look at the place. "Hey, can I show her around?"

"Sure," you say. 
     All of a sudden you feel naked and you wonder if everything is put away. Neat. In order, as if this is a blind date or something.

     "So, how do you like living here?" she nonchalantly asks?
     "Oh. Yeah. It's great." The landlord eyes you to shut-up but you keep going. "I love it. Here. It's great." And just when you think you're home free, you say something like, "Except for the showers. It's like running a marathon in there." Dammit. SNAFU.
     "Well, I'm just going to show her the laundry room."
     "Bye." The landlord gives you an even worse evil eye than before. You put your head down in shame and go back to whatever renters do in their rented apartments.

Have you experienced any odd triangulations with your landlord? Feel free to post and share! (See that comment button down there? Use it. Don't be a lurker).

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Should I Move Now? — On Moving from New Orleans to New York City

A view of Carrollton Avenue from the streetcar

As I peer out onto S. Carrollton Avenue where I've made my home for the past two years, I decide to rechristen my neighborhood, "The Path Where the Oaks Begin".
At the intersection of Palmer Park and Carrollton, the palm trees end and the oaks begin (but they end too, further down and over on St. Charles).

I came to New Orleans after ten years (more or less, with a brief hiatus abroad) living in St. Benedict, Louisiana.

There my life was directed by an horarium (literally) and circumscribed by a 1200 acre loblolly and part deciduous forest (we had both low-lying magnolias and tall proud pines).

I was a seminarian destined to be a Benedictine and a priest. But, that career choice did not quite bloom into a permanent life decision. My advent into the secular world was a half transition.

I had a car and a bachelor's pad but I still worked for the Church - a la the Christian Brothers.

I like to say my last two years as a civilian have been my own Teach for America.

I turned in my last lesson plan last week, said goodbye to my adorable students, and have decided to rid myself of Nola.

The next few weeks will be a transition time for me.

If you've been a faithful reader of stones of erasmus, I thank you.

I will continue to post, of course. I disconnected my home Internet so my online forays are limited to iPhone 3G splendor and desperate dashes to the corner hot spot (password: shangrila).

I'll try to document the transition to the best of my ability.

Be assured unsolicited words of encouragement are welcome.

P.S.: I'm not sure where I'll be living in the Big Apple but I'm eyeing anywhere along the Red line in the Bronx or even Morningside Heights. I've even considered Staten Island, Jersey City, and Harlem.

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Mandeville High School Class of 1998: Graduation Speech I Never Gave

   

I graduated from Mandeville High School (class of 1998).

Here is a transcript of a speech I wrote — but since

I was not selected to be the graduation speech-giver — here is the

speech verbatim (that I never gave).

I walk often behind my house.  I bring my trusty spaniel, and we conquer what there is to conquer.  I notice the turtles and the snakes.  The flowers grow silently, and I stumble their humble beauty.  I become a discoverer.  I lift stones to peer at the scampering centipedes and worms.  I climb aged oaks and jump over running streams.  Sometimes I sit quietly or read the book I had tucked beneath my arm.
    Our journey through these Halls of Learning has been like a journey through the woods.  Close your eyes and remember your school experience.  Remember your discoveries, remember your first-grade teacher, remember your favorite teachers, remember the evil teacher, remember music class, remember recess, remember dances, remember the bully -- were you the bully? — remember tests, remember labs, remember football games.  Remember school like a walk through the woods.  Pick the wildflowers of your school memories and don’t forget the poison ivy.  Remember the sweetness of the one you loved.  Just sit and remember, and it will all come like a stream flowing.
    For twelve years, we have been offered a platter of knowledge.  We were given the chance to pick from its variety of choice fruits.  The Homeric metaphors and the rhythms and workings of the body have been offered us.  E=MC^2.  Supply and demand.  Manifest Destiny.  Endless conjugations of foreign language verbs.  We will leave these halls with a diploma.  It will say more than a graduation certificate.  It says we have gone through the treasures of boundless knowledge and survived.  We have survived the words.  We have been led by Puck, Heathcliff, Virgil, and Prospero.  We have been led by Newton, Einstein, Madame Curie, and Michelangelo.  We have been led by Franklin, Lincoln, Luther, Douglass, Dix, Charlemagne, and Tubman.
    These woods can be dark and brooding like Snow White in the forest with living trees clawing out at us.  Other times the woods are bright and copious.  Wolves are sparse and goodness is near. Sometimes the skies open and torrents of rainfall, like King Lear in the heath, and cleanses us.  We have been nurtured through our journey and now we find ourselves at the edge of the forest, peering out into the wide expanse.  We can’t turn back now but must plow forward.
    I like to think we are all knights of knowledge on our horses prancing toward the rising sun, singing in our heads the Simon and Garfunkel song, “I’ve got my books and my poetry to protect me.  I’m shielded in my armor — safe within my room [or shall we say safe with our diploma?] — I touch no one and no one touches me — I am a rock; I am an island.”  It has always given me comfort to know I have all the poets, saints, sinners, builders, politicians, princesses, kings, slaves, and singers behind us.  We can carry the Divine Comedy, the Principia Mathematica, and the Holy Scriptures, all tucked beneath our arms — ready to go beyond the woods and into the mountains.
    We have so many experiences and emotions that have welled up in us these many years.  My English teacher Melanie Plesh said it so correctly, “We are tender creatures, so affected by words and actions from other people.”  We have been molded by so many people, words, and actions that have sculpted us.  We have watched ourselves develop in our souls spiritually, mentally, and physically.  We were babes, now we are mature — nourished by our fathers, mothers, brothers, and sisters.  Thanks for the woods, the cleansing.
    Now we can offer the world our pain, our laughter, and tears.  We can share our poetry and our logic.  I am girded by my friends — my mail is heavy, but I remind myself: “We are the stuff dreams are made of.”

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Photo: A Portrait by Casey

A family member took this photo of me when I was younger (c. the 1990s). Maybe I was ten years old? I still have the photograph. So here is a copy of it (after it went through the scanner).

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Story From The Classroom: A Severe Whooshing Sound

The following is an excerpt from my book “Things I Probably Shouldn’t Have Said And Other Faux Pas”. Buy a copy on Amazon.

Catholic High School. Saint Charles Avenue. New Orleans. I'm a school teacher. Yesterday, while teaching a lesson and facing the chalkboard, the noise stops. As soon as I return to the board, the noise escalates.

I immediately become angry. "Shit," I mutter, reaching for the call button on the wall that connects directly to the disciplinarian's office. I turn to the class. It's spring. We're all fatigued. It's time to go home, to build castles in the sand, to grow tired of school, to dive into summer. I see that, I know that. But damn, the noise must have been intentional. Who made that noise? I’m not a happy teacher.

"Somebody better fess up before the office responds," I say. Almost immediately, a boy in the front row meekly raises his hand. "It was, ummmm, me." He looks mortified, as if I had just told him he has a few seconds to live.

But I know this student: he's not malicious. He may have a penchant for destruction, but he's certainly not hell-bent on making my life miserable. "So," I say, "Why are you making those whooshing noises?! I can't think straight."

I feel like Ludwig Wittgenstein, the world-class philosopher who would easily get angry in the classroom and bop ignorant children on the head. But he was teaching kindergarten, and I'm a ninth-grade English teacher. A flawed one at that. The student says, "I didn't realize." I want to be like Wittgenstein and bop him on the head, but I don’t.

The intercom blares, "Yes? May I help you?" "No," I say. "I'm good. Got it under control." The intercom clicks off. The class sighs. The student perks up a bit, "I thought you were going to kill me, for a second." The kid looks at me with a sheepish grin. He’s one of those kids who wants to be badass, but he is too sweet to be truly malevolent. I laugh. In a good way. The class laughs. As if it had been a huge practical joke. The joke’s on me.

"That noise felt like it was destroying my thoughts."

"I didn't know I was making any noise," he says. I’m slightly suspicious. The kid smiles as if he knows what he's saying. Nods. The class is chatting. A classroom loves drama. Any kind of drama. It’s the inner logic of kids in a group. Any distraction will disarm their learning neurons — is there a version of docere et delectare — to teach and to delight?

I’m slowly losing control of this class. I never wanted to be a teacher of children. It should have been obvious at the job interview when I said, “I dislike bratty adolescents.” Maybe the teacher who interviewed me didn’t hear me when I thought it out loud and didn’t say anything.

I say to the class as a way to recover, "OK. As I was saying." We go on with the lesson. I'm over it. But the class isn't. The kid can't help himself. "You need a hug?" he asks in a slightly insouciant manner that adolescent boys are wont to do.

"No, I'm good. Just take your pen out of your mouth. OK?"

After class, I feel bad. Silly, even. "I'm sorry," I say. He smiles, puts on my prop that I use for Of Mice and Men.

"You scared me for a second, Mr. Roselli. I thought I was going to get in trouble. Usually, when you're mad, you still have a smile on your face. Here, Mr. Roselli, have a hand sandwich." He shakes my hand like I shake theirs, with both hands like a sandwich.

Even if he did mean it, I realize I reacted swiftly. I scared the kid. Good thing he really didn't mean it.

Well, now I know where that whooshing sound has been coming from all year. Maybe he'll finally stop. He picks up his slugger stick — an affectionate term the boys’ baseball team has given to what I would call a bat. He exits. He comes back in, with masking tape and a sign, "Please do not touch." He puts it over the intercom.

"Funny," I say. "Now, go home."

Tomorrow will be another fiasco. In a nightmare, they crowd me in like the demon in Children of the Corn. But today is a good day. A student tells me she likes poetry, thinks about the meaning of the lyrics. One student wrote a poem about being adopted.

Jim left me a note on my desk. It read:

Dear Mr. Rosselli [sic],

I know you must be stressed. I feel stressed sometimes too, especially because of all the homework you give. I think it would be best for all of us if you were less stressed. My mom and I visited the humane society the other day and we saw the cutest dog ever. I think you need a dog to love you and you can love back. I think if you had a dog you would be less stressed and we wouldn't feel so stressed neither.

Sincerely your student,

Jim

He wanted me to have a dog. So simple. From the mouth of babes. One observation about ninth graders: they remember in spurts. Just like me bolting for the call button. I spurt. One girl pipes up, "I remember what a hyperbole is?!" Good, I think; I feel like one right now. The boy with the pen makes sure he puts away his pen.

"You'll miss us when you're gone?" I don't answer. Just smile. "You know you love us."

And I guess I do. Let someone else mind the gap, teach tone and imagery, gerunds, infinitives, and first-person point of view. Today I want peace of mind. A kid laughs when another kid talks about "reading for pleasure." As if he's coding for a dirty word. "Y'all are sick," I say, instead of saying, stop being immature. I scan the classroom before the bell rings. I sometimes wonder why I am here. Where will they be?

Have seeds been planted? But, who needs a mentor? We need a teacher. But, who wants to be taught? The apple-faced kids? I turn out the lights, take my tie off. I hate wearing this stuff.

The hallways become quiet. I'm leaving soon. On to something else. I decide to stay at school later than usual because I'm giving a workshop to the faculty on how to use Google Docs in the classroom.

I feel conflicted because I know my time at this school will soon end. It's time. I knew this even before I began. I have given my two years. A few more weeks left. Finals. Summer. "Yes," I say. As I finish up the last remaining details for the presentation, I begin to be in my feelings. I will miss them. I am the last teacher to leave for the day. The Toyota Echo that has been mine for the past two years sits alone in the parking lot. I notice the gates have been shut which is odd, because usually, they are open. I am locked out. Or locked in. I call a teacher. A few. No one is around to help me - no custodians. No administrators. No kids. Using my key, I go back into the building and then exit through the front door that leads out to Saint Charles Avenue where I take the olive-green streetcar home to my nest; it arrives on time as if out of a dream, out of the night, under oak trees and nighttime amblers, the streetcar is an obvious symbol of journey, made more noticeable by how I feel at that moment, standing with a brown messenger bag, and ungraded papers. I have left the Toyota behind, to be a watcher of a school without kids, without me, because in a way I will miss teaching, but, I long for New York more. I leave for the Big Apple at the end of the school year. I wonder if I'll see my students in the future? I wonder what we'll learn? Are we home?"

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Teaching Journal: A Nonsensical Rant on Teaching Ancient Literature to Ninth Graders

Uncredited Photograph of a Road

Why None of My Students "Dig" Homer (Or Virgil) 

I finally figured out why none of my students likes the Odyssey or the Iliad, or the Aeneid (except in an anti-nostalgic, oh yeah, my parents read that in High School, kind of way; or oh yeah, I am supposed to like this story because my grandfather read it in the original Greek, or oh yeah, someone told me it was good; I'm supposed to like it, like I am supposed to like Catcher in the Rye because my English teacher read it as an adolescent).

There are better narratives to pursue. That’s why. 
I would love to teach Six Feet Under as an epic - or Angel the Vampire with a soul - or even heck, Mio, my Mio by Lindgren. I am flipping tired of Odysseus. He was an unlikeable twat. I really don't like him anymore. Why do we stick to the tried and true "classics"? Folks are swayed by better narratives that fit their current milieu, but we still drill them with Macbeth and Julius Caesar. Here I am teaching about the rage of Achilles where most kids have figured that out living with themselves nowadays is tantamount To Achilles’ rage. I don’t need to teach an ancient greek epic for them to figure out their own narcissistic tendencies. Now, granted, as a ninth grader, I loved the tale of the Odyssey, but my teacher was unique. She did not care if we actually “read” the book. What she would do is weave stories in class based on the epic story relating to events in real life. For example: Penelope. She would talk about the plight of the single mother—something we could relate to in the classroom, because a majority of us came from single family homes. But, even the kids who didn’t read got the gist of what my teacher was saying and passed the tests. Here I am teaching the Odyssey, about a man longing for home, but most kids don’t have a home (at least in the metaphysical sense of the word) so the story is lost on them in the reading, only to come alive when I mention that perspective.
 

But, I am being hyperbolic. 
Both the Odyssey and the Iliad are vibrant tales. Home, loss, anger, curses, fathers, mothers, sex, honesty, revenge, you name it. The issue isn’t the brilliance of this ancient epic, but rather, the children I teach are already subsumed in their own epics. I know I am going to get fire for saying this, but TV shows nowadays—if you scan through them — have their own brand of epic tonality that beats the Ancient Greeks. Take for example Skins — a brilliant TV series from the BBC. The beginning scenes of its first episode about a Telemachus named Tony— the shenanigans of a British teenager—beat out the tumultuous fatherloss of Telemachus in the first four books of the Odyssey. Like I said, it is not that the ancient epics were not good—but heck—I am trying to teach a beautiful epic here, where kids are completely toned out. They won’t read the thing, save for a few of them, who are secretly bitter that they are the only ones reading. I have too much to compete with: Madea, Fuel, Adult Swim, American Idol (okay, here I will say the ancient epics are paramount). I am not sure anymore what makes a narrative great. I am not sure anymore about the CANNON.
 

I will parse my argument out better here: 

... take the epic of the Odyssey. What do we want to teach when we introduce this story? Home? Right? Isn’t that the core of the story? the return home? Why the Odyssey? Why can’t we teach the same theme with something like Skins? I really don’t understand. It is funny: because an epic is more than a thousand years old, it’s legit. But, god forbid we teach a story that is only a few months old. The naysayers will say the ancient epics are better written. But, I say that is a bunch of bulls*&^. I could create a lesson that teaches everything I already teach using film and popular culture: heroes, antagonists metanoia, epiphany, journey, inner journey, archetype, you name it. I think if I teach Ancient Lit again, I am going to only teach the Odyssey, Gilgamesh, and Oedipus Rex as primary texts. Everything else will be excerpts, mixed in with television: Angel, Six Feet Under, Dexter, and Welcome to the Dollhouse. 

What do you think? How do I teach the themes of Ancient Literature? Is it still relevant? Post your comments.

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Poem: "apple-faced kids"

when the clock sounds

the apple-faced kids

rush to class

not to learn

but to whiz in their heads

the wonders of the world

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Me, describing him

"when I look at him now —

face scrunched into the shape of an oval —

he thinks with his jaw set"

— me, describing him

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Eavesdropping on the Saint Charles Streetcar at Common

    Waiting in the cold morning after a New Year's Eve out! The pavement is moist with the evening's fodder. A brazen, foolish girl prances towards downtown barefoot as a foolish boy admonishes her. Twelve of us wait for the 4:15. Multiple taxis vrooom by. One stops. A couple gets in, frustrated with waiting. A group of handsome guys on my left banter in a language I can't detect.PDF Copy for Printing

Short Story: Car Keys

… the nonsense of men is called business; the nonsense of boys, though exactly alike, is punished by those same men: and no one pities either boys or men.

– Augustine of Hippo

Measuring my life by how many times I locked keys in the car would be appropriate because I have done it since I was a kid. One vivid memory was at my brother’s soccer game, eleven years old. I had gone back to get something out of the family car, a book or somesuch, and no sooner had I slammed the door shut that it hit me like a panic — I had locked the damn keys in the car. Now, remember I was a kid. I stood still for a few seconds, my mind racing inside, the thud of the slammed door still thudding in my chest.

It had happened -- locked keys in the car -- but I wanted to make sure it really had happened. I jostled the door. Realization. Reluctance … a quiver … it had happened. I could see the keys positioned comfortably on my dad’s vinyl seat. Oh no. I started to pace, indecisively; I surmised if I paced long enough I would either

1.) disappear or

2.) the car door would miraculously unlock itself and all would be put right. Nothing like that happened. I wiped my hands on my shorts. Checked my pockets. I tried all the doors a second time to see if one of them would open. A large lump in the gut of me; the feeling of swinging on a tire, a tingling that tintinnabulates in your groin.
If only I could move mountains, I thought to myself. Like Jesus. Only weeks ago I had convinced my buddy Jeremy Accuri that I could uproot our family White Oak. The familial quercus alba that my mom had planted to measure out the life of the Roselli family, I wanted to aggressively uproot. When Mom had planted the tree, it was a youngster; by now it is either mowed down or handsome. But I can remember Jeremy Accuri and me invoking God’s aid for about an hour to no avail. If only I had faith the size of a mustard seed, I thought to myself. I was really disappointed, not that I thought that I could really do it, but I expected something would happen. A manifestation. An epiphany. But no epiphanies, so Jeremy and I went to his house to eat ham sandwiches his mom had made. I can remember how amazed his mother was that I ate everything on my plate. twice. If only she knew how defeated I felt.

And empty.

Poem: "to beget"

the world does not provoke    the world is provoked

so
    does              “the
                     world is too much with us”
mean
don’t be materialistic
            ?
or does it mean something like
                    there is nothing out there to catch the eye
because “we lay waste our powers …”
    (to say something inside is a better argument, wordsworth?)
        which is why giving up on nature walks is probably a good thing
the ants have nothing to say
    “Little we see in Nature that is ours”
                        are not perturbed    really by being stared at,
    or the moth
even the stumbled upon lizard,
    pitifully its glistening eyeball falling out of its manacled socket
is not sorry    does not get its feelings hurt if moved off the pavement
the same if accidentally stepped on
        or Wordsworth is writing about arrogance    ,    here
the panache of human beings to believe us so provocative!
    something like prometheus stealing fire; his goddamn hubris —
                        for does he really think the tritons managed
such         a         gaze        can         he be that trite?

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Poem: Juice Stained Man

Memoir: Things I Probably Shouldn't Have Said (And Other Faux Pas)

Nonfiction Reflection: Earliest Philosophical Memory

My earliest philosophical memory is wondering about the meaning of the word “narrow.” I was like seven and I had heard the word spoken by an adult earlier in the day. Or, maybe I had heard spoken by an adult on television. The evening news. Or. One of the deliberate adults on Sesame Street. It was a new sound and I did not know the meaning. I said the word out loud, “Narrow.” Behind my house was a strip of woods and beyond that was a sugarcane field. I was an outdoors brat and I had had brought my bike through an entangled cobweb of thorn bushes in those woods behind my house. The passage was hard to navigate. I was brushing off thorny branches when I realized what the word “narrow” meant. I distinctly remember thinking about how I had to come to this realization — when I was relieved to come out of the woods amidst the rows and rows of sugarcane. I was startled that I had stumbled upon new knowledge and was desirous to know where this ability to realize originated. To this day I mark this moment as my earliest philosophical memory. Pretty cool, huh?

When was your first philosophical memory? Post a reply. I wanna know.

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Quasi-Movie Review: On Pondering the Movie Wall-E While Doing Chores

I woke up this morning and weirdly began to ponder that movie Wall-E that I saw last Winter. I woke up oddly early this morning, which is uncommon for me when I do not have to work (and the fact that I had a piercing pain in my lower dorsal area). I made my cup of coffee and went and sat on my deck (not my desk) and began adding to a Wiki I am working on for my MLIS program. I was feeling uncharacteristically productive -- which led me to the Wall-E premise and the added fact that I have been following David Pogue's advice to add typing expansion software to a computer (I decided on TypeItForMe after reviewing Typinator and TextExpander).
  So, with all of this productivity racing in my mind Wall-E seems to be an apt patron saint. On screen he seems so pleasant in his daily diurnal chores, that for a minute, I was co-joined with him in a kind of ecstatic state (not like Saint Teresa in Ecstasy, but close to it), as I went about my apartment, which is usually quite a mess, but has been recently quite clean and organized (although I still cannot find anything). If you are wondering: the motivation to clean my house is threefold: 1.) I thought I was going to have my better friend on Saturday and 2.) on Monday I have a house guest for a week so I thought it kind to spruce the place up a bit. The third motivation is summertime and I have nothing else to do but add to the décor of this apartment in which I will probably be staying for at least another year. I added a runner rug to the hallway leading to the bathroom; I found a wooden red upholstered bench behind a dumpster; I hung some picture frames in my bathroom; I cleaned a pile of dishes (ahem) that had been uncleaned and hanging out on my deck for three months (I am not even joking); I vacuumed my house with a Dyson that Lorie lent me; and, I have a cleaning appointment with Stanley Steemer later this month. Fucking Christ, I am becoming a veritable Ms. Molly homemaker. Can someone please come over and confirm my identity? I think I have been taken over by a poltergeist who goes by Martha Stewart in the daytime and Julia Child by night. Jesus. But, really, this has been good for me. This past year I have lived in basic squalor, so it is nice to know what a real apartment should look like. And the fact that Wall-E was able to keep his junk closet neatly organized has given me grace.

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