Steven Harper's Blog, page 77
August 3, 2017
DNA Testing and Me
Darwin did it, so I did it. Just for fun, I sent my DNA in for ancestry testing at ancestry.com . The results came back a few days ago, and they were surprising in that there were no surprises:
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49% Europe East (Latvia)
23% Europe West (France and Germany, mostly)
28% Other regions (England, Wales, Scotland)
The half Latvian side is what I expected. Lots of farmers in my family over there, and they didn't move around much. But considering the number of times Latvia has been invaded and occupied, I was wondering if some DNA from farther east might have wandered into the bloodline. Nope! My dad's side of the family seems to have avoided that.
The other half did surprise me, but it was the lack of surprise that was the surprise. The Drakes and Bacons (my mother's side) have been in North America for centuries and at least one Drake owned slaves--plenty of time and chances for African and Native American genes to enter the family. But nope! Nothing there. The web site gave me some more specific information, too, which said my mother's half mostly arrived in New York and Connecticut, which I knew already.
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Why Kids Can't Write
The New York Times posted this article about students and writing. Go have a look and come back:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/02/education/edlife/writing-education-grammar-students-children.html
It's interesting and shows a number of teachers who have different approaches to solving the problem of students who can't write well. But, as the article notes, people complaining of a lack of writing skill in America dates back to at least 1874. The article also fails to point out the two biggest reasons we have that many students don't write well, and I'll address them here.
1. Student Motivation A lot of students--the majority of them--just don't care if their writing sparkles and zings. They really don't. They only want to know what they can do to earn a certain grade. For some, this grade is an A, and for some it's a D, and some don't even care about that much. Only a tiny handful actually care about learning how to be a better writer. This describes the vast majority of the population, really. Ask a thousand people on the street how many of them enjoy writing and want to improve their writing skill. You'll come up with a vanishingly small percentage. A teacher can only teach what the student wants to learn. A student who puts in minimal effort will see minimal improvement. In my own classroom, I use a number of techniques and activities to cheerlead and motivate and attempt to persuade that they should work to improve their writing, but in the end, they have to want to do the work. I can't force them. No one can. It has to come from the students.
2. Class Size A glaring omission from the article is the impact of class size. Teacher A talks about identifying a great sentence in a student's work, and Teacher B talks about having all her students read their writing aloud in class. Very nice. Then I look at my class lists. 35 students. 34 students. 37 students. How the hell? I simply can't go through my students' writing and look for "great sentences." And having my students read their writing aloud to the class? I do that with ONE assignment per year, and it takes three full days, plus one make-up day for students who were absent. I can barely provide feedback on essays by circling responses on a rubric. I agree that teacher feedback and student rewrites are important to improving student writing, but when you have 34/35/37 students in class, with a third of them special needs, you just can't do it. Back in the days when my classes were 21/22/19, I gave a lot more feedback, and my students did a lot more writing. Now? I scrape by with the minimum because I can only evaluate so many papers at once.
You'll notice that the above two situations aren't within the teacher's control. Motivation ultimately has to come from within. Class size is dictated by budgets. If you really want to improve student writing, parents need to set an example for their kids to provide the motivation and vote to improve school funding to help with the budget.
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https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/02/education/edlife/writing-education-grammar-students-children.html
It's interesting and shows a number of teachers who have different approaches to solving the problem of students who can't write well. But, as the article notes, people complaining of a lack of writing skill in America dates back to at least 1874. The article also fails to point out the two biggest reasons we have that many students don't write well, and I'll address them here.
1. Student Motivation A lot of students--the majority of them--just don't care if their writing sparkles and zings. They really don't. They only want to know what they can do to earn a certain grade. For some, this grade is an A, and for some it's a D, and some don't even care about that much. Only a tiny handful actually care about learning how to be a better writer. This describes the vast majority of the population, really. Ask a thousand people on the street how many of them enjoy writing and want to improve their writing skill. You'll come up with a vanishingly small percentage. A teacher can only teach what the student wants to learn. A student who puts in minimal effort will see minimal improvement. In my own classroom, I use a number of techniques and activities to cheerlead and motivate and attempt to persuade that they should work to improve their writing, but in the end, they have to want to do the work. I can't force them. No one can. It has to come from the students.
2. Class Size A glaring omission from the article is the impact of class size. Teacher A talks about identifying a great sentence in a student's work, and Teacher B talks about having all her students read their writing aloud in class. Very nice. Then I look at my class lists. 35 students. 34 students. 37 students. How the hell? I simply can't go through my students' writing and look for "great sentences." And having my students read their writing aloud to the class? I do that with ONE assignment per year, and it takes three full days, plus one make-up day for students who were absent. I can barely provide feedback on essays by circling responses on a rubric. I agree that teacher feedback and student rewrites are important to improving student writing, but when you have 34/35/37 students in class, with a third of them special needs, you just can't do it. Back in the days when my classes were 21/22/19, I gave a lot more feedback, and my students did a lot more writing. Now? I scrape by with the minimum because I can only evaluate so many papers at once.
You'll notice that the above two situations aren't within the teacher's control. Motivation ultimately has to come from within. Class size is dictated by budgets. If you really want to improve student writing, parents need to set an example for their kids to provide the motivation and vote to improve school funding to help with the budget.
comments
July 29, 2017
A Lazy-ish Ride
Today I persuaded Darwin to go on a bike ride with me. He's not a big fan of bike riding--his bike spends most of its time hanging from the garage ceiling--but I get around this by simply telling him I'm going on a ride and if he wants to spend time with me, he can come along. Even when he knows that's what I'm doing, it works...
There's simply nowhere around our house to ride a bike decently, so we have to drive to a trail to ride with our bikes on the back of the car. The section of trail we usual ride, however, has a long, long section with no shade on it, which is fine in the spring or fall, but miserable in summer. I looked up a section of the trail a little farther down and we drove down there to start our ride.
This turned into a miniature Afternoon Outing.
We rode along a nice, shady biking trail, which eventually took us through the town of Orchard Lake. I'd ridden around the downtown area years ago and knew Darwin likes exploring downtowns, so I suggested we leave the trail and go exploring. He liked this idea.
The first thing we saw off the trail was a sign for a real estate open house, and it pointed toward a huge 19th-century brick mansion.
"We should go look inside!" I said.
"Let's!" Darwin said. He parked his bike and strode up to the door.
Darwin and I love old houses, so this was fun for us. The real estate agent probably knew we weren't serious lookers, but he had literally nothing else to do, so no one minded.
The house was empty, and I think the owner was down-sizing. It was built in 1860, and very well kept--and updated. Everything was wood floors and crown moldings and grand fireplaces. A staircase curled up the front hall, and I found a servants staircase going down the back. The second floor had a master suite and a guest suite and servant's quarters (off the master suite). The basement was room after room of fieldstone and ancient wooden doors, and included a small safe that looked to be original to the house. But the place was updated to include a gas furnace and AC and a huge modern kitchen. And it had several hundred feet of lakefront across the road. Asking price? $999,000. Whew!
We left the house and biked into town, where we found a diner called the Early Bird Cafe for lunch. Darwin adores diners. I hate them--their menus are always exactly the same. (I think that's why Darwin likes them.) But he went on the ride with me, so I went into the diner with him. This is marriage. And we had a very nice lunch.
Afterward, we rode back through lovely Michigan summer weather.
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There's simply nowhere around our house to ride a bike decently, so we have to drive to a trail to ride with our bikes on the back of the car. The section of trail we usual ride, however, has a long, long section with no shade on it, which is fine in the spring or fall, but miserable in summer. I looked up a section of the trail a little farther down and we drove down there to start our ride.
This turned into a miniature Afternoon Outing.
We rode along a nice, shady biking trail, which eventually took us through the town of Orchard Lake. I'd ridden around the downtown area years ago and knew Darwin likes exploring downtowns, so I suggested we leave the trail and go exploring. He liked this idea.
The first thing we saw off the trail was a sign for a real estate open house, and it pointed toward a huge 19th-century brick mansion.
"We should go look inside!" I said.
"Let's!" Darwin said. He parked his bike and strode up to the door.
Darwin and I love old houses, so this was fun for us. The real estate agent probably knew we weren't serious lookers, but he had literally nothing else to do, so no one minded.
The house was empty, and I think the owner was down-sizing. It was built in 1860, and very well kept--and updated. Everything was wood floors and crown moldings and grand fireplaces. A staircase curled up the front hall, and I found a servants staircase going down the back. The second floor had a master suite and a guest suite and servant's quarters (off the master suite). The basement was room after room of fieldstone and ancient wooden doors, and included a small safe that looked to be original to the house. But the place was updated to include a gas furnace and AC and a huge modern kitchen. And it had several hundred feet of lakefront across the road. Asking price? $999,000. Whew!
We left the house and biked into town, where we found a diner called the Early Bird Cafe for lunch. Darwin adores diners. I hate them--their menus are always exactly the same. (I think that's why Darwin likes them.) But he went on the ride with me, so I went into the diner with him. This is marriage. And we had a very nice lunch.
Afterward, we rode back through lovely Michigan summer weather.
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July 28, 2017
Hollywood and Magic Computers
Yesterday, Darwin and I were watching a Big Name Spy Thriller on DVD. It had the same plot every other spy thriller uses:
STEP ONE: Spy Protagonist learns of an object he needs to get hold of in order to save the world or himself (called "the McGuffin").
STEP TWO: Spy rushes from exotic location to exotic location in search of the McGuffin while various Bad People try to kill him. Various vehicle chases through crowded cities ensue. Much time is spent on Magic Computers.
STEP THREE: An Evil Person within the Spy's own organization, who is secretly employing the Bad People, tries to sabotage the Spy's efforts and nearly succeeds.
STEP FOUR: The Spy gets the McGuffin, kills the Bad People, and kills the Evil Person.
We want to look at the Magic Computers.
Goodness me, computers can do anything these days! Especially in a movie. According to the movie Darwin and I watched, in fact, a computer and its attached hacker can:
1. delete a thousand files from another computer in a split-second
2. shut off the electricity to a single building in a foreign country with less than a minute's work
3. track down a single person whose face appears on a traffic camera anywhere in the world seconds after his face shows up
4. grab control of a landline telephone and use that phone to take control of an unconnected laptop sitting a foot away from it (I shit you not--the movie actually had a CIA hacker do this)
5. enhance a distant, blurry photo of a woman into a photo clear enough to use on a magazine cover in less than a second
6. hack into one of the most secure mainframes in the world while the owners of said mainframe watch helplessly (why they don't simply unplug their modems goes unexplained)
7. instantly toss video and photo files to huge, Star Trek-style screens on a wall without anyone ever saying, "Hold it . . . hold it . . . dammit, the system is really slow right now . . . a couple more seconds . . . okay, here we go . . . "
8. instantly notice when a particular person even touches a computer anywhere in the world or accesses a particular file saved on a flash drive, but CAN'T TRACK A CELL PHONE!
Not one of these things is remotely possible today. Number 4 had both Darwin and me in an outrage, it was so stupid. And this movie (one of the Jason Bourne flicks, if you have to know) isn't in any way unusual.
Hollywood computers and computer operators can find out literally anything, in seconds, in ways that bear no resemblance to reality. If you need to know it or find it, a computer will do it for you, no matter how outrageous. All you need is a character who is supposed to be a "brilliant hacker." ("Brilliant hacker" is code for "magician.") Hackers and computers are basically witches with crystal balls.
It's become a bad trope. True hacking or other computer ability takes years and years of practice. You need to study code, spend weeks writing programs, make friends with other hackers and learn the seamy underside of the Internet. It's an extremely precise field. If you make a mistake, you'll get caught right quick, with dire consequences. The field also changes every day, sometimes every minute, and you have to keep up.
But Hollywood treats computer work like musical talent. You can sit the right person with the right talent down at a computer, and BAM! Instant hacker who can get you exactly what you need to know. It gets so bad that on SUPERGIRL, Winn went from low-level IT guy to having the ability to take down an alien computer system--with a virus he wrote in the nineties! Because . . . talent, right? Because there are people who can sit down at a piano and turn out amazing work with almost no experience, so it must be the same with computers, right?
No. It doesn't work that way. All the computer talent in the world won't grant you knowledge and precision. Hollywood is just using a cheap trick. As a writer, I can understand wanting a quick tool to push the story forward. The Magic Computer will do that. The problem is, Hollywood does it so often, and so badly, that it's become a bad, BAD cliche.
And have you noticed that no one ever touches a mouse? It's true! Hollywood is all about fingers chattering on the keyboard. In reality, of course, everyone--including hackers--spends most of their time with mouse and cursor. A clicking keyboard is more dynamic on the silver screen, though, so Hollywood runs with it. Except we've noticed. (Now that I've pointed it out to you, you won't be able to help but notice it!)
Please, Hollywood--end the Magic Computer. We know better.
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STEP ONE: Spy Protagonist learns of an object he needs to get hold of in order to save the world or himself (called "the McGuffin").
STEP TWO: Spy rushes from exotic location to exotic location in search of the McGuffin while various Bad People try to kill him. Various vehicle chases through crowded cities ensue. Much time is spent on Magic Computers.
STEP THREE: An Evil Person within the Spy's own organization, who is secretly employing the Bad People, tries to sabotage the Spy's efforts and nearly succeeds.
STEP FOUR: The Spy gets the McGuffin, kills the Bad People, and kills the Evil Person.
We want to look at the Magic Computers.
Goodness me, computers can do anything these days! Especially in a movie. According to the movie Darwin and I watched, in fact, a computer and its attached hacker can:
1. delete a thousand files from another computer in a split-second
2. shut off the electricity to a single building in a foreign country with less than a minute's work
3. track down a single person whose face appears on a traffic camera anywhere in the world seconds after his face shows up
4. grab control of a landline telephone and use that phone to take control of an unconnected laptop sitting a foot away from it (I shit you not--the movie actually had a CIA hacker do this)
5. enhance a distant, blurry photo of a woman into a photo clear enough to use on a magazine cover in less than a second
6. hack into one of the most secure mainframes in the world while the owners of said mainframe watch helplessly (why they don't simply unplug their modems goes unexplained)
7. instantly toss video and photo files to huge, Star Trek-style screens on a wall without anyone ever saying, "Hold it . . . hold it . . . dammit, the system is really slow right now . . . a couple more seconds . . . okay, here we go . . . "
8. instantly notice when a particular person even touches a computer anywhere in the world or accesses a particular file saved on a flash drive, but CAN'T TRACK A CELL PHONE!
Not one of these things is remotely possible today. Number 4 had both Darwin and me in an outrage, it was so stupid. And this movie (one of the Jason Bourne flicks, if you have to know) isn't in any way unusual.
Hollywood computers and computer operators can find out literally anything, in seconds, in ways that bear no resemblance to reality. If you need to know it or find it, a computer will do it for you, no matter how outrageous. All you need is a character who is supposed to be a "brilliant hacker." ("Brilliant hacker" is code for "magician.") Hackers and computers are basically witches with crystal balls.
It's become a bad trope. True hacking or other computer ability takes years and years of practice. You need to study code, spend weeks writing programs, make friends with other hackers and learn the seamy underside of the Internet. It's an extremely precise field. If you make a mistake, you'll get caught right quick, with dire consequences. The field also changes every day, sometimes every minute, and you have to keep up.
But Hollywood treats computer work like musical talent. You can sit the right person with the right talent down at a computer, and BAM! Instant hacker who can get you exactly what you need to know. It gets so bad that on SUPERGIRL, Winn went from low-level IT guy to having the ability to take down an alien computer system--with a virus he wrote in the nineties! Because . . . talent, right? Because there are people who can sit down at a piano and turn out amazing work with almost no experience, so it must be the same with computers, right?
No. It doesn't work that way. All the computer talent in the world won't grant you knowledge and precision. Hollywood is just using a cheap trick. As a writer, I can understand wanting a quick tool to push the story forward. The Magic Computer will do that. The problem is, Hollywood does it so often, and so badly, that it's become a bad, BAD cliche.
And have you noticed that no one ever touches a mouse? It's true! Hollywood is all about fingers chattering on the keyboard. In reality, of course, everyone--including hackers--spends most of their time with mouse and cursor. A clicking keyboard is more dynamic on the silver screen, though, so Hollywood runs with it. Except we've noticed. (Now that I've pointed it out to you, you won't be able to help but notice it!)
Please, Hollywood--end the Magic Computer. We know better.
comments
July 27, 2017
The Missing Vacation
A couple weeks ago, while Aran was at camp, Darwin and Max and I went on vacation. I didn't report it here well, did I?
We rented a cottage up near Harbor Springs for a week. The cottage overlooks Lake Michigan in the northern UP. The cottage was very nice, but not situated as well as we had hoped. It didn't have much a lake view, and to get to the lake, you had to go down many, many wooden steps, which were picturesque but serious work on the way back up! Also, that far north, the lake is still cold and not very swimmable. The beach itself was beautiful, though, and private, with only the occasional bear to keep us company.
It was a relax-acation. We slept late and drove to nearby towns for window shopping and movies and walks on their piers. I picked up some books at a used book sale at the local library and turned down an invitation to appear at a local book festival. (Forty other authors were going to be there, so I'd be one face in a huge crowd, and anyway I've never known book festivals to even pay transportation and hotel costs, let alone noticeably boost sales). We ate a lot of ice cream and I cooked local foods in the cottage's well-appointed kitchen. My mother and her husband Gene came up for an overnight visit as well, and we played euchre well into the night. Later, we hit Mackinaw Island, which is one of our favorite day-
Darwin and I explored a tiny local cemetery at one point and had a misadventure. The cemetery hadn't been mowed a while, and I stepped backward onto what I thought was level ground. It turned out to be a collapsed grave with grass that had grown up to ground level. The unexpected level change made me lose my balance, and I reflexively snatched at a pillar-style headstone in front of me. But the pillar turned out not to be fastened down to the base by mortar or metal bars and it tipped right toward me. I felt my ankle give way. I managed to twist a little, and both I and the pillar, which weighed several hundred pounds, landed in the collapsed grave with a thunk.
Darwin thought the pillar had landed on me. It had missed me by a hair. But my ankle was sprained. I couldn't get up at first. We were a gazillion miles from nowhere, and Darwin had visions of trying to carry me to the car. But I managed to stand. My ankle was weak and sore but functional.
The pillar, which was shaped like the Washington Monument and for an 80-year-old grandmother who died 100 years ago, still lay in the indented ground. Darwin and I tried to lift it, but no way. Too heavy, and my ankle was an impediment. Feeling bad about it, we left. What choice did we have?
But a couple days later, we were driving around and passed the graveyard again. My ankle was much improved and Maksim was with us. The pillar was still down. We decided to see if the three of us could right it on its base. And lo, we did it! Granny's grave was restored!
At the end of the week, we came home. It was a nice break!
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We rented a cottage up near Harbor Springs for a week. The cottage overlooks Lake Michigan in the northern UP. The cottage was very nice, but not situated as well as we had hoped. It didn't have much a lake view, and to get to the lake, you had to go down many, many wooden steps, which were picturesque but serious work on the way back up! Also, that far north, the lake is still cold and not very swimmable. The beach itself was beautiful, though, and private, with only the occasional bear to keep us company.
It was a relax-acation. We slept late and drove to nearby towns for window shopping and movies and walks on their piers. I picked up some books at a used book sale at the local library and turned down an invitation to appear at a local book festival. (Forty other authors were going to be there, so I'd be one face in a huge crowd, and anyway I've never known book festivals to even pay transportation and hotel costs, let alone noticeably boost sales). We ate a lot of ice cream and I cooked local foods in the cottage's well-appointed kitchen. My mother and her husband Gene came up for an overnight visit as well, and we played euchre well into the night. Later, we hit Mackinaw Island, which is one of our favorite day-
Darwin and I explored a tiny local cemetery at one point and had a misadventure. The cemetery hadn't been mowed a while, and I stepped backward onto what I thought was level ground. It turned out to be a collapsed grave with grass that had grown up to ground level. The unexpected level change made me lose my balance, and I reflexively snatched at a pillar-style headstone in front of me. But the pillar turned out not to be fastened down to the base by mortar or metal bars and it tipped right toward me. I felt my ankle give way. I managed to twist a little, and both I and the pillar, which weighed several hundred pounds, landed in the collapsed grave with a thunk.
Darwin thought the pillar had landed on me. It had missed me by a hair. But my ankle was sprained. I couldn't get up at first. We were a gazillion miles from nowhere, and Darwin had visions of trying to carry me to the car. But I managed to stand. My ankle was weak and sore but functional.
The pillar, which was shaped like the Washington Monument and for an 80-year-old grandmother who died 100 years ago, still lay in the indented ground. Darwin and I tried to lift it, but no way. Too heavy, and my ankle was an impediment. Feeling bad about it, we left. What choice did we have?
But a couple days later, we were driving around and passed the graveyard again. My ankle was much improved and Maksim was with us. The pillar was still down. We decided to see if the three of us could right it on its base. And lo, we did it! Granny's grave was restored!
At the end of the week, we came home. It was a nice break!
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July 23, 2017
Beer, Art, and Karma
On Saturday, Darwin and I tried to stop by the Ypsilanti Beer Festival. Neither of us really cares for beer, but it's a major local event and Darwin is city manager, so he wanted to put in an appearance. When we arrived, however, the line to get into the park was several blocks long, and more people arrived to get in it as we watched. So we gave that up as a bad job and headed for our next stop--the Ann Arbor Art Fair.
The AA Art Fair is going on 30 years, and is a sprawling affair that runs over many, many city blocks in downtown Ann Arbor, with food, music, street performers, and miles and miles of artists displaying their work. We had our bikes with us, and we parked on a side street a ways from the fair and pedaled the rest of the way in, which avoided the usual $20 parking fees. We chained our bikes to a lamp post and started browsing.
It was a hot day, and clouds came and went. I thought to bring an umbrella with us, though, and I put it up for shade when the sun came out. This made Darwin unhappy at first--he felt it was strange, and he was afraid I would hit someone--but he very quickly discovered the huge benefits of portable shade, and his objections quickly vanished.
We wandered through the fair. I found a potter's booth and bought a matching spoon rest, liquid soap dispenser, and sponge holder for the kitchen.
At one of the many food areas, where a collection of local restaurants set up wagons and trucks, I got some delicious Korean noodles while Darwin ordered a plate of food from a Greek place. At the last minute, the cook plopped tzatziki sauce on top of it all before Darwin could stop her. Darwin doesn't like tzatziki, and told the woman so. She shrugged and made him a new plate. "Do you want this one?" she said to me. "I'll just throw it away otherwise."
"Sure," I said. She wrapped it in foil, and I took it. Darwin and I headed for a shady patch of sidewalk to eat. I actually had no idea what to do with the plate of food. I couldn't put it in my backpack without making a mess, and I couldn't carry it on my bike. It seemed a shame to toss it, though.
We were just about done eating when a homeless man--unkempt white hair, unshaven, thin, dirty clothes--shambled up to me. He looked at my noodles, and then at me.
"Hi," I said.
"Can I have some?" he rasped.
"As it happens," I said, "you can." And I handed him the wrapped up plate. He thanked me and wandered off with it.
"That worked out," Darwin observed.
Beer, art, and karma, all in one day.
comments
The AA Art Fair is going on 30 years, and is a sprawling affair that runs over many, many city blocks in downtown Ann Arbor, with food, music, street performers, and miles and miles of artists displaying their work. We had our bikes with us, and we parked on a side street a ways from the fair and pedaled the rest of the way in, which avoided the usual $20 parking fees. We chained our bikes to a lamp post and started browsing.
It was a hot day, and clouds came and went. I thought to bring an umbrella with us, though, and I put it up for shade when the sun came out. This made Darwin unhappy at first--he felt it was strange, and he was afraid I would hit someone--but he very quickly discovered the huge benefits of portable shade, and his objections quickly vanished.
We wandered through the fair. I found a potter's booth and bought a matching spoon rest, liquid soap dispenser, and sponge holder for the kitchen.
At one of the many food areas, where a collection of local restaurants set up wagons and trucks, I got some delicious Korean noodles while Darwin ordered a plate of food from a Greek place. At the last minute, the cook plopped tzatziki sauce on top of it all before Darwin could stop her. Darwin doesn't like tzatziki, and told the woman so. She shrugged and made him a new plate. "Do you want this one?" she said to me. "I'll just throw it away otherwise."
"Sure," I said. She wrapped it in foil, and I took it. Darwin and I headed for a shady patch of sidewalk to eat. I actually had no idea what to do with the plate of food. I couldn't put it in my backpack without making a mess, and I couldn't carry it on my bike. It seemed a shame to toss it, though.
We were just about done eating when a homeless man--unkempt white hair, unshaven, thin, dirty clothes--shambled up to me. He looked at my noodles, and then at me.
"Hi," I said.
"Can I have some?" he rasped.
"As it happens," I said, "you can." And I handed him the wrapped up plate. He thanked me and wandered off with it.
"That worked out," Darwin observed.
Beer, art, and karma, all in one day.
comments
July 21, 2017
Dress Codes: the Final Word
My cousin Mark drew my attention to yet another rant about a girl who was sent home because her clothes violated the school dress code. The mother posted photos of the offending outfit and howled that he daughter was body-shamed and the victim of a sexist school.
Sure.
As a high school teacher of 22 years, let me explain how this works--and what to do about it.
First, schools have the legal right to create dress codes or even force students to wear uniforms. The Supreme Court has ruled, it's law, and that's the way it is. Read Tinker v. Des Moines Independent School District for full details, or look here: http://education.findlaw.com/student-rights/school-dress-codes.html If you don't like it, the place to make a change is with your legislative body, not in the principal's office. You will be completely unsuccessful if you storm into the school and shout, "You can't send my child home for wearing _____!" Absolutely the school can, and the full force of the US government is behind it, so save your energy. (But see below for what you CAN do.)
Second, school dress codes are written to set a basic standard of appropriateness. The school board decides, based on community standards, what is and is not appropriate for students to wear in school. This isn't new, it's not strange or bad. There are certain outfits and articles of clothing that are inappropriate for school, just like there are inappropriate outfits for worship services, a funeral, a wedding, or a job. My youngest son recently applied for a job, for example, and he was handed an extremely strict dress code. Our entire society dictates what you can wear and when. Schools are no different. Dress codes are NOT written to body shame girls or to stop girls from wearing clothes that will "distract boys." I'm not sure where this idea got started.
Proper dress codes, such as the one in the district where I teach, spell out what clothes are allowed and which are not. My district does not allow spaghetti straps, sleeveless shirts, off-shoulder shirts, visible underwear, "muscle" shirts, tank tops, or shorts above a certain length. The sex of the wearer is irrelevant. Both boys and girls cannot wear tank tops or short shorts. If a boy showed up in spaghetti straps, he'd be sent home, though he'd be allowed to wear a skirt that came down to at least his fingertips. A school that DOES mention girls not being allowed to wear Thing A and boys not being allowed to wear Thing B is asking for trouble and needs to change its code to focus on the clothes and not the wearer.
Third, students are not allowed to use clothes to "express themselves" and "be comfortable." I'm not sure where that idea got started, either. A student's primary job at school is to learn, and anything that interferes with that job must be removed. The Supreme Court has also ruled on this (see Tinker above). A school may, at its discretion, allow a certain amount of self-expression, but this is solely the district's choice, and not the student's. That's the way it is, and you won't have much luck in changing a Supreme Court ruling. Save your energy.
Fourth, it's absolutely true that dress codes are often enforced unevenly. That's just the nature of the animal. This is because the main enforcers are teachers, and teachers are wildly different as people, and circumstances vary from class to class. Here's what happens:
Linda wears an inappropriate outfit to first hour. The teacher notices, but doesn't see enforcing the dress code as important, so she lets it go. Linda's second hour has 37 students in it. Linda slips into class and sits down while the teacher is dealing with 42 other problems, and the teacher doesn't even notice the outfit because he's so busy. Linda's third hour teacher notices the outfit, but also notes that Linda only comes to class one day in four, and if he sends her out, she'll miss today, too, and he'd rather have her stay in class, so he says nothing. Linda's fourth hour is gym, and she changes clothes for that one. Linda's fifth hour has a sub who doesn't understand the dress code and says nothing. Linda's sixth hour teacher says, "Your outfit isn't appropriate. You'll have to go down to the office and change or go home." "That's not fair! I've been wearing it all day!" Linda protests.
So yes, the codes aren't always enforced fairly. Such is life. If you want to ensure the codes are fairly enforced, you could volunteer to the district to be a dress code monitor. Call today!
What do you do if you run into dress code problems with your student?
First, per-emptively make sure your student has a selection of appropriate clothes. Teenagers push back, yes. Welcome to parenthood. Your job is to be a mom or dad, not a best friend. Remove inappropriate clothes from their wardrobe. Also be aware that even well-behaved teens will sometimes rebel, and a common tactic is to change clothes at school. If this happens and your student gets in trouble with the office, let them deal with it without support from you. Don't leave work to rush over with a new outfit. Let them wear the ugly set of school sweats all day or sit in the office until the end of school. It's a learning experience.
Second, understand that posting a rant on Facebook or Instagram about your daughter being "body-shamed" isn't anything but a bid for attention. You're just fishing for people to say how wronged you were and how lovely your daughter is, and you're secretly hoping the district will get deluged with emails or phone calls so they'll make changes without any work from you. The district won't cave to random phone calls and emails from strangers outside the district. Experienced administrators know that all they have to do is wait a week, and the outrage will die down. Nothing will change, though you may have duped a few more people into following you on Instagram, and it's pretty shitty to drag the school into your scheme.
Finally, if you think the dress code is unfair, get a group of like-minded parents together and talk to the school board. (Not the principal--the principal generally has no control over the dress code.) Going in a group will give you more clout. Outline what changes you think should be made, without yelling. If the code mentions the gender of the student, lobby to have it reworded to focus on the clothing instead. Have a list of reasons. Avoid things like "she needs to feel comfortable" or "he wants to express himself." Those won't go far. Instead, focus on things like, "These clothes are acceptable in our community," and "This is accepted public dress around here."
We have dress codes at work, in worship, and yes, in school. Having them in school gets students ready for dealing with them in adult life. They aren't going away, though you can have an impact on them if you do it right.
comments
Sure.
As a high school teacher of 22 years, let me explain how this works--and what to do about it.
First, schools have the legal right to create dress codes or even force students to wear uniforms. The Supreme Court has ruled, it's law, and that's the way it is. Read Tinker v. Des Moines Independent School District for full details, or look here: http://education.findlaw.com/student-rights/school-dress-codes.html If you don't like it, the place to make a change is with your legislative body, not in the principal's office. You will be completely unsuccessful if you storm into the school and shout, "You can't send my child home for wearing _____!" Absolutely the school can, and the full force of the US government is behind it, so save your energy. (But see below for what you CAN do.)
Second, school dress codes are written to set a basic standard of appropriateness. The school board decides, based on community standards, what is and is not appropriate for students to wear in school. This isn't new, it's not strange or bad. There are certain outfits and articles of clothing that are inappropriate for school, just like there are inappropriate outfits for worship services, a funeral, a wedding, or a job. My youngest son recently applied for a job, for example, and he was handed an extremely strict dress code. Our entire society dictates what you can wear and when. Schools are no different. Dress codes are NOT written to body shame girls or to stop girls from wearing clothes that will "distract boys." I'm not sure where this idea got started.
Proper dress codes, such as the one in the district where I teach, spell out what clothes are allowed and which are not. My district does not allow spaghetti straps, sleeveless shirts, off-shoulder shirts, visible underwear, "muscle" shirts, tank tops, or shorts above a certain length. The sex of the wearer is irrelevant. Both boys and girls cannot wear tank tops or short shorts. If a boy showed up in spaghetti straps, he'd be sent home, though he'd be allowed to wear a skirt that came down to at least his fingertips. A school that DOES mention girls not being allowed to wear Thing A and boys not being allowed to wear Thing B is asking for trouble and needs to change its code to focus on the clothes and not the wearer.
Third, students are not allowed to use clothes to "express themselves" and "be comfortable." I'm not sure where that idea got started, either. A student's primary job at school is to learn, and anything that interferes with that job must be removed. The Supreme Court has also ruled on this (see Tinker above). A school may, at its discretion, allow a certain amount of self-expression, but this is solely the district's choice, and not the student's. That's the way it is, and you won't have much luck in changing a Supreme Court ruling. Save your energy.
Fourth, it's absolutely true that dress codes are often enforced unevenly. That's just the nature of the animal. This is because the main enforcers are teachers, and teachers are wildly different as people, and circumstances vary from class to class. Here's what happens:
Linda wears an inappropriate outfit to first hour. The teacher notices, but doesn't see enforcing the dress code as important, so she lets it go. Linda's second hour has 37 students in it. Linda slips into class and sits down while the teacher is dealing with 42 other problems, and the teacher doesn't even notice the outfit because he's so busy. Linda's third hour teacher notices the outfit, but also notes that Linda only comes to class one day in four, and if he sends her out, she'll miss today, too, and he'd rather have her stay in class, so he says nothing. Linda's fourth hour is gym, and she changes clothes for that one. Linda's fifth hour has a sub who doesn't understand the dress code and says nothing. Linda's sixth hour teacher says, "Your outfit isn't appropriate. You'll have to go down to the office and change or go home." "That's not fair! I've been wearing it all day!" Linda protests.
So yes, the codes aren't always enforced fairly. Such is life. If you want to ensure the codes are fairly enforced, you could volunteer to the district to be a dress code monitor. Call today!
What do you do if you run into dress code problems with your student?
First, per-emptively make sure your student has a selection of appropriate clothes. Teenagers push back, yes. Welcome to parenthood. Your job is to be a mom or dad, not a best friend. Remove inappropriate clothes from their wardrobe. Also be aware that even well-behaved teens will sometimes rebel, and a common tactic is to change clothes at school. If this happens and your student gets in trouble with the office, let them deal with it without support from you. Don't leave work to rush over with a new outfit. Let them wear the ugly set of school sweats all day or sit in the office until the end of school. It's a learning experience.
Second, understand that posting a rant on Facebook or Instagram about your daughter being "body-shamed" isn't anything but a bid for attention. You're just fishing for people to say how wronged you were and how lovely your daughter is, and you're secretly hoping the district will get deluged with emails or phone calls so they'll make changes without any work from you. The district won't cave to random phone calls and emails from strangers outside the district. Experienced administrators know that all they have to do is wait a week, and the outrage will die down. Nothing will change, though you may have duped a few more people into following you on Instagram, and it's pretty shitty to drag the school into your scheme.
Finally, if you think the dress code is unfair, get a group of like-minded parents together and talk to the school board. (Not the principal--the principal generally has no control over the dress code.) Going in a group will give you more clout. Outline what changes you think should be made, without yelling. If the code mentions the gender of the student, lobby to have it reworded to focus on the clothing instead. Have a list of reasons. Avoid things like "she needs to feel comfortable" or "he wants to express himself." Those won't go far. Instead, focus on things like, "These clothes are acceptable in our community," and "This is accepted public dress around here."
We have dress codes at work, in worship, and yes, in school. Having them in school gets students ready for dealing with them in adult life. They aren't going away, though you can have an impact on them if you do it right.
comments
July 18, 2017
Ypsilanti Dirt
Today I visited the Ypsilanti Historical Library for the Work in Progress. I needed to verify a few facts. To do so, I needed to check the history of the First Presbyterian Church of Ypsilanti, which was founded in the early 1800s. They first met in a frame house, then built a brick church with one spire, then rebuilt the church so it had two spires. I've been trying to find out exactly when the two spires version was done. I have three different dates, and can't seem to verify any of them.
Anyway, the Historical Library archives has a file on the FSCoY, and the archivist cheerfully handed it over to me for perusal. It's a hanging file about four inches thick, stuffed with a pile of papers, transcripts, orders of service, century-old pamphlets, and other memorabilia. One object in the file is a heavy, punch-bound book of transcripts. I paged through it and realized someone had typed up all the hand-written notes from weekly church meetings from 1832 until 1875. This had to be a monumental task--the original pages were included in the file, and the handwriting old-fashioned, spidery stuff done with a dip pen, barely legible. This historian had meticulously read and typed up hundreds of pages, and for this I was grateful.
The church meetings were mostly records of who had joined the church (lots of people moved to Ypsilanti from other areas, and they seem to have brought with them letters of recommendation from their previous ministers, which helped matters), who had been baptized, and who had left the church, either by moving away or dying.
There were several references, incidentally, to the church calling various members up in front of the council to defend themselves for drinking, either beer or hard liquor. (Temperance was a hot social topic in Michigan during this time period, and apparently the First Presbies landed on the "alcohol is evil" side.) One member confessed to the drinking, but said it was "for his health." The council rejected this argument and banned him from attending church until he could prove he had made proper penance (which wasn't specified). This sort of thing seemed to happen fairly often, and you would think the church would give it up as a lost cause, but the council showed continued enthusiasm for alcohol's punishment and penance.
The last page truly caught my eye. It seemed to be random notes. It said:
Mr. Hammond's Testimony - that Mrs. G. admitted he got in a passion - was sorry that it had happened - cross examined - Mrs. Hammond - Talking hard of her Mother Octavia - could live in this way -
Mrs. Hyde - choked - threw potatoes -
- - pushing his wife
- - pushing his Motherinlaw [sic] - ordering her out the door -
William Glover -
What the heck? "Got in a passion"? Was this anger? Sex? Who threw potatoes?
I paged through more of the book. In entries dated April, 1835, my eye flitted across another reference to Samuel Glover. There were several references to him and to Mrs. Hyde over several weeks. Eagerly, I paged over them, flipping backward until I found the earliest one--and the beginning of the story.
From what I could gather from Church Clerk Ezra Carpenter's cryptic notes, Samuel Glover was married to Virena Glover, and they had a son William. Virena's mother Lucy Hyde lived with them, and she and Samuel did NOT get along.
According to Virena, the two of them fought quite often, mostly because Samuel beat Virena. One day, Virena was carrying in a heavy basket of potatoes, and she asked Samuel to help her. He refused, and she became upset with him. He shouted and cursed at her and threw several potatoes at her head, until Lucy intervened and told him to stop. This didn't make Samuel very happy.
Another time, Samuel was arguing with Virena and shouting at her in the front yard. A neighbor saw Lucy trying to get him to stop.
Another tidbit says Samuel called a neighbor a "God damned Frenchman." Someone else testified to him shouting "J___ C____" in public. (Ezra Carpenter refused to put "Jesus Christ" into a transcript as a curse, though he readily put the word "god" down as one.) Someone else testified to hearing Samuel use the word "devilish" to describe his children, and also calling them "little devils."
Another time, Lucy Hyde testified that Samuel whirled an ox whip over Virena's head and swore he would beat Virena "by J____ C____." She also said she saw Samuel choke Virena and push her to the floor more than once.
Then Samuel got really mad at Lucy and one day literally shoved her out the door, ordering her to never "darken his doorstep" again and "if I rotted above ground he would never bury me." She went to a friend's house, and the next day various people persuaded her to return. Samuel allowed that she could as long as she was nice to him. Lucy reluctantly returned.
The pastor asked if Samuel was nice to Lucy after that, but (according to Mr. Carpenter's terse prose), Lucy wouldn't answer directly, which speaks volumes.
Samuel claimed he had witnesses who would speak to his good character, but none of them showed up at any of the hearings, which also speaks volumes.
In the end, the council rendered its unanimous, terrifying verdict: Samuel was guilty of violating the church's covenant in multiple ways.
His sentence?
No church for three months.
That's it. And there were no more references to Samuel Glover or Lucy Hyde in the rest of the book.
I doubt Samuel stopped abusing Virena and Lucy. I suspect he just got better at hiding it--or of terrifying them into silence. Lucy was already uncertain about testifying this time. I hope they eventually left him, or threw him out, but I doubt it. The church couldn't even bring itself to censure Samuel for more than 90 days, let alone grant a divorce.
And you'll notice that despite several people testifying that Samuel was guilty of assault many times over, there was no mention of legal involvement. None. Virena and Lucy went to the church for help, and barely got any. (The testimony took place over several weeks.)
Domestic abuse. It ain't a new idea.
Incidentally, I did find the date of the spire, but it was from a secondary source, and it's still unconfirmed for me. Sigh.
ETA
A little digging turned up a bit more information elsewhere. Samuel and Virena (whose name may have been Vinera--records disagree) had a total of twelve children. The last two were twins, born on February 14, 1847 in Osceola, Michigan, which means the Glovers moved. The twins died two weeks later. Virena died the following March at age 44. So Virena stayed with Samuel another 11 years and died, worn out from giving birth over and over, and from the beatings he gave her. (Another Glover child, Sarah, died two years later, by the way, at age 24.)
And Samuel? He left Ypsilanti and slunk back to New York, where his parents originally came from. By 1850, he was married to a woman named Maria, who had five children of her own. Only TWO of Samuel and Virena's children came with him--Alanson and Daniel. What happened to the others?
Three--Sarah and the twins--had died.
Four were adults by 1850 and didn't need to live with their families. None were living in Ypsilanti. It's telling that they moved away from their father.
Samuel Glover, Jr. (age 15) went to live with a merchant named John Cody and his family.
Vinera Josephine Glover (age 10) is unaccounted for. She is not with her father or any of her adult brothers or sisters. Where did she go? She marries William P. Paine in 1857 in Ionia County, Michigan. She would have been about 17 then, though the question is, how did she get all the way up to Ionia and meet him?
George W. Glover (age 8) vanishes entirely. No records of what happened to him exist.
The 1860 censucs shows Maria Glover (Samuel's second wife) Census living in Webster, New York as a widow, but Samuel is still alive at this time and living a little ways away in Rochester, New York. He died in 1870. Did Maria divorce him and lie about her marital status? What happened there?
Having a blended family that's a hot mess isn't anything new!
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Anyway, the Historical Library archives has a file on the FSCoY, and the archivist cheerfully handed it over to me for perusal. It's a hanging file about four inches thick, stuffed with a pile of papers, transcripts, orders of service, century-old pamphlets, and other memorabilia. One object in the file is a heavy, punch-bound book of transcripts. I paged through it and realized someone had typed up all the hand-written notes from weekly church meetings from 1832 until 1875. This had to be a monumental task--the original pages were included in the file, and the handwriting old-fashioned, spidery stuff done with a dip pen, barely legible. This historian had meticulously read and typed up hundreds of pages, and for this I was grateful.
The church meetings were mostly records of who had joined the church (lots of people moved to Ypsilanti from other areas, and they seem to have brought with them letters of recommendation from their previous ministers, which helped matters), who had been baptized, and who had left the church, either by moving away or dying.
There were several references, incidentally, to the church calling various members up in front of the council to defend themselves for drinking, either beer or hard liquor. (Temperance was a hot social topic in Michigan during this time period, and apparently the First Presbies landed on the "alcohol is evil" side.) One member confessed to the drinking, but said it was "for his health." The council rejected this argument and banned him from attending church until he could prove he had made proper penance (which wasn't specified). This sort of thing seemed to happen fairly often, and you would think the church would give it up as a lost cause, but the council showed continued enthusiasm for alcohol's punishment and penance.
The last page truly caught my eye. It seemed to be random notes. It said:
Mr. Hammond's Testimony - that Mrs. G. admitted he got in a passion - was sorry that it had happened - cross examined - Mrs. Hammond - Talking hard of her Mother Octavia - could live in this way -
Mrs. Hyde - choked - threw potatoes -
- - pushing his wife
- - pushing his Motherinlaw [sic] - ordering her out the door -
William Glover -
What the heck? "Got in a passion"? Was this anger? Sex? Who threw potatoes?
I paged through more of the book. In entries dated April, 1835, my eye flitted across another reference to Samuel Glover. There were several references to him and to Mrs. Hyde over several weeks. Eagerly, I paged over them, flipping backward until I found the earliest one--and the beginning of the story.
From what I could gather from Church Clerk Ezra Carpenter's cryptic notes, Samuel Glover was married to Virena Glover, and they had a son William. Virena's mother Lucy Hyde lived with them, and she and Samuel did NOT get along.
According to Virena, the two of them fought quite often, mostly because Samuel beat Virena. One day, Virena was carrying in a heavy basket of potatoes, and she asked Samuel to help her. He refused, and she became upset with him. He shouted and cursed at her and threw several potatoes at her head, until Lucy intervened and told him to stop. This didn't make Samuel very happy.
Another time, Samuel was arguing with Virena and shouting at her in the front yard. A neighbor saw Lucy trying to get him to stop.
Another tidbit says Samuel called a neighbor a "God damned Frenchman." Someone else testified to him shouting "J___ C____" in public. (Ezra Carpenter refused to put "Jesus Christ" into a transcript as a curse, though he readily put the word "god" down as one.) Someone else testified to hearing Samuel use the word "devilish" to describe his children, and also calling them "little devils."
Another time, Lucy Hyde testified that Samuel whirled an ox whip over Virena's head and swore he would beat Virena "by J____ C____." She also said she saw Samuel choke Virena and push her to the floor more than once.
Then Samuel got really mad at Lucy and one day literally shoved her out the door, ordering her to never "darken his doorstep" again and "if I rotted above ground he would never bury me." She went to a friend's house, and the next day various people persuaded her to return. Samuel allowed that she could as long as she was nice to him. Lucy reluctantly returned.
The pastor asked if Samuel was nice to Lucy after that, but (according to Mr. Carpenter's terse prose), Lucy wouldn't answer directly, which speaks volumes.
Samuel claimed he had witnesses who would speak to his good character, but none of them showed up at any of the hearings, which also speaks volumes.
In the end, the council rendered its unanimous, terrifying verdict: Samuel was guilty of violating the church's covenant in multiple ways.
His sentence?
No church for three months.
That's it. And there were no more references to Samuel Glover or Lucy Hyde in the rest of the book.
I doubt Samuel stopped abusing Virena and Lucy. I suspect he just got better at hiding it--or of terrifying them into silence. Lucy was already uncertain about testifying this time. I hope they eventually left him, or threw him out, but I doubt it. The church couldn't even bring itself to censure Samuel for more than 90 days, let alone grant a divorce.
And you'll notice that despite several people testifying that Samuel was guilty of assault many times over, there was no mention of legal involvement. None. Virena and Lucy went to the church for help, and barely got any. (The testimony took place over several weeks.)
Domestic abuse. It ain't a new idea.
Incidentally, I did find the date of the spire, but it was from a secondary source, and it's still unconfirmed for me. Sigh.
ETA
A little digging turned up a bit more information elsewhere. Samuel and Virena (whose name may have been Vinera--records disagree) had a total of twelve children. The last two were twins, born on February 14, 1847 in Osceola, Michigan, which means the Glovers moved. The twins died two weeks later. Virena died the following March at age 44. So Virena stayed with Samuel another 11 years and died, worn out from giving birth over and over, and from the beatings he gave her. (Another Glover child, Sarah, died two years later, by the way, at age 24.)
And Samuel? He left Ypsilanti and slunk back to New York, where his parents originally came from. By 1850, he was married to a woman named Maria, who had five children of her own. Only TWO of Samuel and Virena's children came with him--Alanson and Daniel. What happened to the others?
Three--Sarah and the twins--had died.
Four were adults by 1850 and didn't need to live with their families. None were living in Ypsilanti. It's telling that they moved away from their father.
Samuel Glover, Jr. (age 15) went to live with a merchant named John Cody and his family.
Vinera Josephine Glover (age 10) is unaccounted for. She is not with her father or any of her adult brothers or sisters. Where did she go? She marries William P. Paine in 1857 in Ionia County, Michigan. She would have been about 17 then, though the question is, how did she get all the way up to Ionia and meet him?
George W. Glover (age 8) vanishes entirely. No records of what happened to him exist.
The 1860 censucs shows Maria Glover (Samuel's second wife) Census living in Webster, New York as a widow, but Samuel is still alive at this time and living a little ways away in Rochester, New York. He died in 1870. Did Maria divorce him and lie about her marital status? What happened there?
Having a blended family that's a hot mess isn't anything new!
comments
July 7, 2017
Superstitions
When I was a kid, my parents firmly believed that you had to wait an hour after a meal before you could go swimming. Swimming during that hour after eating would, at best, give you cramps (though these cramps were never specified--stomach cramps? leg cramps? menstrual cramps?), and at worst, you would somehow DIE (presumably because the cramps would make you double up and you'd drown).
This drove me and my siblings crazy. Mostly it was that it never made the slightest bit of sense. Every time we went to the beach, we'd eat lunch, and my mother--or grandmother--would say, "You have to wait an hour before swimming! So go play."
"Play what?" we'd demand.
"Go play on that playground over there," she'd say. "Or play hide and seek. Or tag. Or whatever else you want. But go play."
In other words, we could use all the muscles we used during swimming AS LONG AS WE WERE ON LAND?? How was it that running and jumping on land wouldn't kill us, but swimming would? How did our cells know we were submerged? "Hey Fred! The body's underwater! Cramp time!" What the hell?
And why an hour? So at 59 minutes and 59 seconds, we'd die if we put a toe into the water, but one second later, we were safe? What?
On top of it all, my mother was a NURSE, and should have known better.
No, swimming after you eat isn't harmful in any way.
We also had this little rhyme: "Step on a crack, and you'll break your mother's back!" It meant if you stepped on a crack in the sidewalk, your mother would die, so you had to watch where you were going. A variant of this was "the devil's back," so you were supposed to step on as many as possible. No one I know seriously believed either one, though--it was just a silly chant and an excuse to dance around on the sidewalk--so I don't know if this counted as a superstition.
The Mid-Atlantic states also have a superstition that says if you eat dessert after a meal of seafood, you'll DIE. Literally keel over and die. The sole exception to this rule is a dessert of lemon custard pie with a saltine crust. Many people believe this superstition to this day, apparently. This is another that falls apart if you look at it closely. What does "dessert" mean? Anything sweet? Does yogurt count? A soda? How long after supper? Midnight? Not until dawn? What if you have an early seafood supper and get hungry around 8:00 and snack on a pudding cup? Will you die? Seriously, people.
What superstitions did you grow up with?
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This drove me and my siblings crazy. Mostly it was that it never made the slightest bit of sense. Every time we went to the beach, we'd eat lunch, and my mother--or grandmother--would say, "You have to wait an hour before swimming! So go play."
"Play what?" we'd demand.
"Go play on that playground over there," she'd say. "Or play hide and seek. Or tag. Or whatever else you want. But go play."
In other words, we could use all the muscles we used during swimming AS LONG AS WE WERE ON LAND?? How was it that running and jumping on land wouldn't kill us, but swimming would? How did our cells know we were submerged? "Hey Fred! The body's underwater! Cramp time!" What the hell?
And why an hour? So at 59 minutes and 59 seconds, we'd die if we put a toe into the water, but one second later, we were safe? What?
On top of it all, my mother was a NURSE, and should have known better.
No, swimming after you eat isn't harmful in any way.
We also had this little rhyme: "Step on a crack, and you'll break your mother's back!" It meant if you stepped on a crack in the sidewalk, your mother would die, so you had to watch where you were going. A variant of this was "the devil's back," so you were supposed to step on as many as possible. No one I know seriously believed either one, though--it was just a silly chant and an excuse to dance around on the sidewalk--so I don't know if this counted as a superstition.
The Mid-Atlantic states also have a superstition that says if you eat dessert after a meal of seafood, you'll DIE. Literally keel over and die. The sole exception to this rule is a dessert of lemon custard pie with a saltine crust. Many people believe this superstition to this day, apparently. This is another that falls apart if you look at it closely. What does "dessert" mean? Anything sweet? Does yogurt count? A soda? How long after supper? Midnight? Not until dawn? What if you have an early seafood supper and get hungry around 8:00 and snack on a pudding cup? Will you die? Seriously, people.
What superstitions did you grow up with?
comments
July 6, 2017
German Reading
A while ago, I heard about the book UND WAS HAT DAS MIT MIR ZU TUN? (AND WHAT DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH ME?) by Sacha Battyany. It's about a man who discovers that in 1945, his great-aunt, who was a countess in Austria, threw a huge party with her husband. Around midnight, she gathered the guests and, at her behest, they went down to a work camp, where they all casually murdered 180 Jews. Then they got into their chauffeur-driven cars and went home.
Battyany, a Millennial, had never heard about this part of his family history. He started digging, and discovered that lots of people knew about this, and the incident had been widely reported in the local news at the time, but no one talked about it. He wrote about his findings and the impact his search had on him and his family.
Battyany wrote in German, and the book isn't available in English until October. I downloaded the sample chapters in German to my Kindle to see what they were like for myself.
I wasn't interested in another book about the Holocaust itself. It's been covered extensively, and I teach MAUS every year to my seniors. I was more interested in this book for the outsider's perspective. What do you do when you learn your family was involved in something terrible? Especially something most of your family knew about but never told you? How do you live, knowing just a few miles away from your house, an entire population is being tortured and killed?
My own family has at least one dreadful person in it. While researching the Drake family tree, I found the will of a cousin or uncle who owned slaves in the 1800s. His will stated that although he had promised one of his slave women her freedom upon his death, he had recently changed his mind because of her "uppity ways" and he was instead willing the slave to his daughter. It makes me sick to think we're related.
So I was interested in Battyany's findings and reaction.
However, German books are hit-or-miss for me. German is a difficult language for non-natives to read, more difficult than Spanish or French, partly because of the structure of the language, but mostly because of the attitude of the writers.
English gives you the sentence in pieces. In general, we start with the subject (who is doing something), then go to the verb (what happens), then we go on to other bits like prepositional phrases that tell us where and when things happen. As an example, take Jimmy should go shopping for his mother in the the city tomorrow. We build a slow picture. First we see Jimmy, then see what he'll do (should go shopping), then who he'll do it for (his mother), then when and where (in the city, tomorrow). We can mix things up a bit, but we still build the picture of what's happening in pieces.
German, however, is a big-picture language. You have to get the whole sentence before you know what's happening. The example sentence above would read in German Jimmy soll morgen in die Stadt fuer seine Mutter einkaufen gehen. This literally means Jimmy should tomorrow in the city for his mother shopping go. Notice the word order. Although we know Jimmy SHOULD be doing something, we don't know what it is until we get to the very end of the sentence, though along the way we learn his mother and the city are involved. In order to understand the meaning, we have to hold the entire sentence in our heads until we get to the end and CLICK! We get the whole picture at once.
This takes some practice, if you didn't grow up doing it. It's like being used to seeing a picture by assembling jigsaw pieces and then suddenly being expected to see it by having it snap into existence on the table.
German writers take an almost malicious glee in creating long, tortuous sentences in which you have no idea what's going on until the last three words of a 100+ word section. In order to get my German degree, I had to read a lot of German literature, most of it written during the angst-ridden post-war years, and it was indeed tortuous to read. It put me off reading German literature for a long, long time.
German newspapers and magazines are equally difficult. Unlike their American counterparts, who keep to a simple, straightforward style meant to be easy for all readers, German journalists deliberately use an awful, long-winded, twisted style, complete with eye-wrenchingly (or jaw-crushingly) long words that no sane person uses in everyday conversation. I don't know where this got started, but it needs to stop. It annoys native Germans, in fact, but journalists keep it up anyway.
And there's the fact that I'm not fluent in German anymore. I used to be, but years of being away from the country and lack of constant practice have rusted me. My understanding is much better than my production, but German is still a greater challenge than it once was.
All this is a roundabout way of saying that I approached Battyany's book with a wary eye. I could wait until October for the English translation, but that felt like cheating. Besides, translations are never as good as the original. So I downloaded the sample chapters in German to my Kindle and cracked it open.
To my delight, I could read it with ease. Battyany, a journalist, avoids the awful German newspaper style and writes in a more conversational style, and I'm having no trouble following him. I stumble across the occasional unfamiliar word (it took me longer than it should have to untangle a reference to semen donation, for example), but like I teach my students to do, I breeze past them unless it's clear I need to know the word or phrase to follow the passage--and in that case, the Internet gives me the translation in seconds. I'm reading slower than in English, but faster than I expected.
Battyany's story is compelling, and when I reached the end of the sample chapters, I downloaded the full novel. A little light reading for vacation! :)
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Battyany, a Millennial, had never heard about this part of his family history. He started digging, and discovered that lots of people knew about this, and the incident had been widely reported in the local news at the time, but no one talked about it. He wrote about his findings and the impact his search had on him and his family.
Battyany wrote in German, and the book isn't available in English until October. I downloaded the sample chapters in German to my Kindle to see what they were like for myself.
I wasn't interested in another book about the Holocaust itself. It's been covered extensively, and I teach MAUS every year to my seniors. I was more interested in this book for the outsider's perspective. What do you do when you learn your family was involved in something terrible? Especially something most of your family knew about but never told you? How do you live, knowing just a few miles away from your house, an entire population is being tortured and killed?
My own family has at least one dreadful person in it. While researching the Drake family tree, I found the will of a cousin or uncle who owned slaves in the 1800s. His will stated that although he had promised one of his slave women her freedom upon his death, he had recently changed his mind because of her "uppity ways" and he was instead willing the slave to his daughter. It makes me sick to think we're related.
So I was interested in Battyany's findings and reaction.
However, German books are hit-or-miss for me. German is a difficult language for non-natives to read, more difficult than Spanish or French, partly because of the structure of the language, but mostly because of the attitude of the writers.
English gives you the sentence in pieces. In general, we start with the subject (who is doing something), then go to the verb (what happens), then we go on to other bits like prepositional phrases that tell us where and when things happen. As an example, take Jimmy should go shopping for his mother in the the city tomorrow. We build a slow picture. First we see Jimmy, then see what he'll do (should go shopping), then who he'll do it for (his mother), then when and where (in the city, tomorrow). We can mix things up a bit, but we still build the picture of what's happening in pieces.
German, however, is a big-picture language. You have to get the whole sentence before you know what's happening. The example sentence above would read in German Jimmy soll morgen in die Stadt fuer seine Mutter einkaufen gehen. This literally means Jimmy should tomorrow in the city for his mother shopping go. Notice the word order. Although we know Jimmy SHOULD be doing something, we don't know what it is until we get to the very end of the sentence, though along the way we learn his mother and the city are involved. In order to understand the meaning, we have to hold the entire sentence in our heads until we get to the end and CLICK! We get the whole picture at once.
This takes some practice, if you didn't grow up doing it. It's like being used to seeing a picture by assembling jigsaw pieces and then suddenly being expected to see it by having it snap into existence on the table.
German writers take an almost malicious glee in creating long, tortuous sentences in which you have no idea what's going on until the last three words of a 100+ word section. In order to get my German degree, I had to read a lot of German literature, most of it written during the angst-ridden post-war years, and it was indeed tortuous to read. It put me off reading German literature for a long, long time.
German newspapers and magazines are equally difficult. Unlike their American counterparts, who keep to a simple, straightforward style meant to be easy for all readers, German journalists deliberately use an awful, long-winded, twisted style, complete with eye-wrenchingly (or jaw-crushingly) long words that no sane person uses in everyday conversation. I don't know where this got started, but it needs to stop. It annoys native Germans, in fact, but journalists keep it up anyway.
And there's the fact that I'm not fluent in German anymore. I used to be, but years of being away from the country and lack of constant practice have rusted me. My understanding is much better than my production, but German is still a greater challenge than it once was.
All this is a roundabout way of saying that I approached Battyany's book with a wary eye. I could wait until October for the English translation, but that felt like cheating. Besides, translations are never as good as the original. So I downloaded the sample chapters in German to my Kindle and cracked it open.
To my delight, I could read it with ease. Battyany, a journalist, avoids the awful German newspaper style and writes in a more conversational style, and I'm having no trouble following him. I stumble across the occasional unfamiliar word (it took me longer than it should have to untangle a reference to semen donation, for example), but like I teach my students to do, I breeze past them unless it's clear I need to know the word or phrase to follow the passage--and in that case, the Internet gives me the translation in seconds. I'm reading slower than in English, but faster than I expected.
Battyany's story is compelling, and when I reached the end of the sample chapters, I downloaded the full novel. A little light reading for vacation! :)
comments
