been awhile ...

Hey Lindsay,

It's been awhile and I need to touch base with you via this blog and let you know that my thoughts, which often wander, like these subordinate clauses that populate my sentences, need to disciplined and documented currently because they tend to dissipate and disappear in the neuronal network of "mon cerveau".

Traveled to Columbia, SC for an onsite in my Young Adult Literature class. We had to present our booktalks ... ours were done on the front steps of Davis College on a brilliant, mildly cool day if not in the sunshine. My talk, which was mostly extemporaneous (others had written theirs out word for word and had memorized them), was on the theme of racial/cultural divides. The books: Maniac Magee by Jerry Spinelli; I know why the caged bird sings by Maya Angelou; Snow Falling On Cedars by David Guterson; and We Are The Ship: The story of the Negro Baseball League by artist and author Kadir Nelson. It went well even though I left out some significant information in Maya Angelou's autobiography, but the other students (5 in all) liked my use of gestures and my talking voice. It has been a fun class and I have enjoyed actually becoming a reader, at least for most of the books.

Work has been great ... mainly because I'm not behind the cash register, a definite liability for Barnes & Noble, but in the information booth. Love helping people find books and engaging with them as we search. A youthful Baptist minister was literally aghast when I informed him of the members in the UU Church (Are you a church? You don't believe in God?) and my agnosticism. In evangelistic zeal he promised to bring me a CD of one of his sermons and advertised his radio spot on local FM radio at 7:30 a.m. on Sundays. Thirty minutes of a sermon I have edited from the previous week. No way he'd last in our church ... it's 60 minutes for the whole shabang, including sermon.

Speaking of which, Margaret Beard talked about gratitude yesterday. A simple gesture, your hand (normally your right) over your heart and then swept outward toward another person. It's saying thank you to that person. I've been spreading it around ... reminds me of the sign for love but simpler. And now that I've mentioned that noun of connectedness and joy, I want to send all my love to you and that I'm looking forward to spending Thanksgiving with you and Uncle Doug, Aunt Norma, and Norma Virginia.

In loving humankindness and joy ... je t'aime beaucoup,
ton père