God is not a Republican or a Democrat

This past Sunday, the pastor at my church read a list of things that won't change regardless of who wins the election tomorrow, and they really stuck with me, enough that I emailed him to ask for the list. Don't get me wrong--I strongly believe that everyone should vote (unless you find yourself completely unable to support any of the candidates, and I can respect that), and I gave my own absentee ballot a lot of thought before filling it out (I originally assumed I'd be bipartisan, but it ended up tripartisan due to having spent so much time trying to find out anything about one of the third-party candidates for one of the more local elections that I ended up filling in his bubble by mistake...oops). But these are the things that will not change, no matter who will be in the White House, the Senate, the House, or lots of other places:

Top 10 Predictions No Matter Who Wins the Election

1. The Bible will still have the answers.
2. Prayer will still work.
3. The Holy Spirit will still move.
4. God will still inhabit the praises of His people.
5. There will still be God-anointed preaching.
6. There will still be singing of praise to God.
7. God will still pour out blessings upon His people.
8. There will still be room at the Cross.
9. Jesus will still love you.
10. Jesus will still save the lost when they come to Him.

(I'm not sure who originally wrote this, as my pastor got it from someone else, so I suppose good old Anonymous gets the credit.)

The essentials of our faith won't change, regardless of who wins. And I, political junkie that I have become, have to keep reminding myself that as important as I believe the election to be tomorrow, the eternal issues aren't at stake. All the fear that I've heard from people on both sides is pointless, because in the end, God wins. And He's not a Republican or a Democrat.

I've read a lot online about the election during the past few months, and I consider myself to be a decently informed voter. But I find myself voting with humility, with the knowledge that, in fact, I could be wrong in my choices of candidates, but the belief that God's will shall prevail regardless, even though it may not seem that way to everyone on Wednesday morning. I'm reminded of Abraham Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address, in which he urges for "firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right." We don't see the big picture. But God does.

I have friends and acquaintances who are devout Christians on both ends of the political spectrum (yay for being a moderate independent!), and I don't believe that belonging to one party or the other is "more Christian"--both parties have issues where Christians can support them, and both fail miserably in this regard with other issues. So tomorrow, vote thoughtfully, prayerfully, and with humility, trusting God that His will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven. And then, whoever wins, support them with your prayers throughout the next four years. They've got a tough road ahead of them.

[x-posted to Facebook]

grad school can be fun...sort of...

Not original content, but something fascinating from my reading for LLT 895 this week. Please read the following passage and hazard a guess as to the subject matter...I'm curious who can figure it out. (Mom, Kate, and Lisa are not eligible, as they've already been subjected to this.)

The procedure is quite simple. First, you arrange the items in separate piles. Of course, one pile may be sufficient depending on how much there is to do. If you have to go somewhere else due to lack of facilities, that is the next step; otherwise, you are pretty well set. It is important not to overdo things. That is, it is better to do too few things at once than too many. In the short run, this may not seem important but complications can easily arise. A mistake can be expensive as well. At first, the whole procedure will seem complicated. Soon, however, it will become just another facet of life. It is difficult to foresee any end to the necessity for this task in the immediate future, but then, one never can tell. After the procedure is completed, one arranges the materials into different groups again. Then they can be put back into their appropriate places. Eventually they will be used once more and the whole cycle will then have to be repeated. However, that is part of life.

The whole idea is that while readers can decode each individual sentence, the overall meaning may be confusing.

(x-posted to Facebook)

swimming in work, not water (although I could...)

It is payday. And there was much rejoicing, even though I'd rather not lose as much money as I do to withholdings. At least I should get a pretty good tax refund next spring...

I suspect that postings this fall may be infrequent, although it's worth checking back for every now and then. 9 credits of grad school (which aren't actually all that reading-intensive, at least not for a former English major...more project-intensive), a 20 hour/week research job, a 2 hour/week tutoring job for a 5th grade Korean girl, and occasional social things to keep myself from going absolutely batty don't leave a lot of time or energy for blogging. Still, we'll see.

I can't believe how much it's rained the past few days...if this is what Ike does to Michigan, I'd hate to see what it's like down South. Wow. The Red Cedar River is supposed to hit 9 feet by Wednesday, with flood stage at 7 feet.

settling in

Random little bits:

I found a frame for one of my oddly-dimensioned pictures from Ukraine. Granted, it has no glass, no back, no hook, and is the wrong color, but the dimensions are right. And all of those other things can be fixed.

Fruits Basket rocks. Both the manga and the anime. Yay for roommate bonding and Kyo-hugging. (What do you mean, he's just a stuffed toy? That's just what you think...)

I had tofu for supper. I don't think I'd ever had tofu before. While it doesn't make the top 10 list of best foods I've ever had in my life, it was pretty good.

As I start a new phase of life as a grad student at MSU, I'm going to try to become more organized, eat healthier, and exercise more. We'll see how this goes, but I'm hopeful. I mean, it has to be easier to make lifestyle changes when you're making other lifestyle changes, right? (That sentence apparently doesn't make as much sense typed out as it did in my head.)

Literature Map

This one's primarily for Lisa: the Literature Map. You type in the name of an author, and it shows you what authors are the most similar, thereby giving you (hopefully) recommendations for new authors.

So Charlotte Bronte shows up the closest to Jane Austen. I'll accept that, even if Bronte had a low regard for Austen's work. However, how on earth did Daphne Du Maurier (author of Rebecca) end up the closest to L. M. Montgomery? Granted, Wilder, Alcott, and L'Engle are close by, but still...

I'd love to know the criteria they're using. For example, Madeleine L'Engle and Dorothy L. Sayers show up next to each other. Okay, I get it. They both deal with theological issues in their fiction (which is often genre fiction, although different genres), and they both have a good grasp of diction. But L'Engle also shows up near Edna St. Vincent Millay, and the only thing I know that they have in common is that I like them both. Probably not what it's based on.

ETA:

So "God" showed up on the map, and I clicked on it, just to see who would be on His map. The list had Jesus next to Him (so far so good), and then a baffling variety of names around them. They included Drew Carey, Joseph Smith, the Holy Spirit, Arthur C. Clarke (of 2001: A Space Odessey fame), Tim LaHaye, Gary Paulsen (Hatchet), Saint Paul, Satan, and Einstein. Wow...

ETA2: Apparently the point is not so much that the authors are similar as that people who will like one will also like the other. It still seems massively flawed to me.

apparently after 7 months, I've slipped back into the habit of driving

Tonight was the Townie Street Party to kick off the Ann Arbor Art Fairs (have I mentioned how much I love the fact that there's always something going on in Ann Arbor? because I do), so various local businesses/services had booths set up. At the Ann Arbor Transit Authority (AATA) booth, the woman asked me, "So are you a mass transit user?"

Yes, ironically, since my car died yesterday when I was up in Lakeview for the Behrenwald reunion and it's going to be up there at least throughout this week so it can be fixed. I'm going to be dependent on my bike and the bus system (which fortunately is doable in A2). It's just sort of annoying, although better that my car die in Lakeview than on a major freeway between here and Lakeview. I biked home from work today (Mom having dropped me off this morning on her way home, as she had driven me down here last night so I could be to work today), and found it to be mighty tiring. I think I'll just plan to bike to the bus stop on the other side of Central Campus that goes past my work, bus up there and back, and then bike home.

The woman was giving out buttons that read "Dump the Pump--RIDE TRANSIT," so I took one. Maybe I'll even wear it this week.

Sigh...

little random bits from this week

It is a truth universally acknowledged that I can't get through the first day of 3.5-5 Year Olds without having at least one child scream for his/her mother for at least 35 minutes. And this one kicked, too...if I have any bruises tomorrow, I'll know where they came from. Other than that, classes have been going well, though.

~*~

Having nothing else to do tonight, I found myself taking various quizzes about politics and religion (two separate categories, not quizzes that dealt with both) on Selectsmart.com. It's been entertaining...apparently either I'm Wesleyan/Methodist (yes) or an Orthodox Quaker (huh?). But my favorite result came from a quiz entitled "Political Roots," where my first place result was a four way tie between Anarchist, Christian/Social Conservative, Liberal Socialist, and Social Democratic. I didn't know it was possible to be all of those things at once. The quiz was written by a Canadian, I believe, so perhaps politics are different up there. At least it confirms that my political opinions don't fit nicely into any party.

~*~

I have four different NPR stations on my pre-sets for my car radio (jazz and blues from Ypsilanti, classical from East Lansing, Michigan Radio from Ann Arbor, and Michigan Radio from Detroit). Does this make me insufferably elitist, or just really lucky to be living in a place where that's an option? :)

~*~

As I drive to work each morning, I drive over a spot on Plymouth Road where it looks like the Latin word "via," meaning "way" (as in "Via Dolorosa" or "Way of Sorrows"), is written with tar on the pavement. It may be a sheer coincidence where tar was spilled at some point, but I'd like to think that a group of Classics students from U-M (which has a very good Classics department) decided to label the road appropriately at some point. It makes me happy each time I go to work.

the unanswerable question

Yesterday I went to a 4th of July barbeque hosted by a woman from First Wesleyan Church in Ypsilanti, where I've been attending this summer. She had also invited the new pastor and his wife, so since out of all the people I didn't know there, they were the ones I had the most connection to, I sat with them.

Knowing that I'm only here for the summer, Pastor Brent asked, "So where do you normally live?"

I started to laugh, as this is currently an unanswerable question. I don't "normally" live anywhere. Lakeview? Well, that's where I lived right before moving here, but it was only for a few months and not where I'll be for the forseeable future. The Lansing area? That'll be the answer in a couple of months, but I haven't lived there in close to three years. Ukraine? Oddly enough, it almost feels like the right answer, except that as far as I know, I'm not going to be living there again.

So I tried to explain the past few years of my life to Pastor Brent, who then said, "Oh, you're a vagabond."

"Well, sort of..." I replied, "except that I put down roots wherever I live..."

"He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment seat"

Warning: mild rant ahead.

I went to the Ann Arbor 4th of July parade this morning, primarily because it seemed like something moderately interesting to do. I'm sure I didn't find it nearly as cool as all the little kids around me did, but it was fun to see an American parade again (Balaklia did lots of holiday celebrations, but I don't remember any parades). The floats were very generous with their candy and other goodies; even as an adult, I ended up with a few Tootsie Rolls, a bag of baby carrots (from some health-food float), and a packet of Forget-Me-Not seeds from a political candidate, which amused me.

The floats were varied and random--everything from fire engines to preschools to old-fashioned bicycles to "Save the Monarch Butterflies". And a LOT of political candidates. You could tell that it was an election year, and the various candidates gave out candy in such copious amounts it was as if they expected the toddlers to vote. However, when the Washtenaw County Republican float came out (most of the Democratic candidates had their own separate floats, but Republicans appear to be enough of a minority that they consolidated), the people around me started to boo. I heard a parent tell her child, "We don't want any of John McCain's candy." And I came away from the parade with a bad taste in my mouth that had nothing to do with candy.

Now first off, let me say that I'm a political independent and don't feel that I align up completely with either party. I think that there are areas where both major parties do a good job, and areas where they fail miserably. If I apply my understanding of the Bible to current political issues, I can't come up with a completely Republican or completely Democratic platform. I think that both presidential candidates this year are decent options, and although I've got some preferences, I'm still undecided who I'll vote for in November (plus I hate jumping on anyone's bandwagon too early, because you never know what new information will come out later, making you look really stupid if you decide to switch sides). And if I'd been at a parade where the people watching were conservatives and were booing a Democratic float and refusing to accept candy handed out by Obama supporters, I'd have been just as annoyed.

All of that said, I was disgusted at the people around me at the parade. I understand that people have strong political feelings, and that's legitimate. However, I thought that their behavior set a poor example for the children that were there. If you don't like a float that goes by, it's perfectly acceptable not to clap. But to boo them is in bad taste. Do we want our children to grow up thinking that it's okay to badmouth people we disagree with? And while the politicians are handing out candy to get their name out and get parents to vote for them, it's not going to make a kid turn Republican just because he accepted candy from a McCain supporter. Honestly, if they wanted to help the Democratic cause, those people should have gotten more candy from the Republicans, because then there would have been less of it for the politicians to give to those undecided people who might be swayed by it. :) (Yes, I am my father's daughter, and this is how my mind works.)

So, a happy 4th of July to all my readers, and a wish for a country where people can disagree respectfully and set a good example for small children. Herein endeth the rant.

paris when it sizzles, ann arbor when it thunders

As it was raining all evening and there were no free concerts courtesy of the Ann Arbor Summer Festival (I assume so, at least, as there was thunder and lightening), I decided to watch the Audrey Hepburn movie, Paris When It Sizzles. Not one of Hepburn's best (nor worst...that goes to Robin and Marian), but there was a quote in it that I found delightful.

"Actually, depravity can be terribly boring if you don't smoke or drink."

Reminds me of some social functions with Peace Corps where I came to pretty much the same conclusion. :)

social justice refrigerator

This deserves its own post.

While cleaning off my coffee table, I decided to hang Alan and Tina's wedding invitation on my refrigerator so I didn't misplace it.

Tina, you should be glad to hear that I used my "Stop Human Trafficking" and "10 tips for going green" magnets. (Granted, it was either those or a couple of magnets for EMU and U-M libraries or my Cyrillic alphabet magnets, but I thought you'd approve of my choice.)

Although I'm not trying to equate marriage and human trafficking...

summer vacation

Apparently going on vacation for a week is good for me. After spending a week with Tif in North Carolina, I got back last night. This morning, I woke up bright and fairly chipper, went for a bike ride, and have since been working at cleaning my apartment, as a) it needed it and b) Liz, Cary, and Jeff are coming over on Sunday for food before outdoor Shakespeare in the Arb. I haven't been this productive in a while (outside of work, that is, as I spent 7 weeks being productive at work and doing not-so-much when I got home). I have about a week and a half left before I go back for summer semester, and between hanging out with multiple friends in the greater Ann Arbor and Lansing, perhaps starting up again on scrapbooking, and going up home for a few days, it's going to go very quickly, I suspect.

Oh, and I realized today that the Ann Arbor Summer Festival is going on, and there are free concerts every night. Yay!

North Carolina was a lot of fun, even though Fayetteville itself seems to primarily be composed of sand, pine trees, and strip malls. Apparently George Washington went through the area once and commented that he was unimpressed, or something like that. But the downtown is nice, and we drove up to the Raleigh-Durham area via rural highways one day and went to the beach at Fort Fisher another day. It was fun and relaxing.

almost done with the first semester

I'm exhausted (and judging by how difficult that was to type correctly, I'm really exhausted).

But I survived one end-of-the-semester party yesterday (10 kids, about 8 parents, and 4 or 5 younger siblings, complete with lots of snacks, all in a fairly small classroom). Tomorrow I have three more end-of-the-semester parties (all of which will be smaller), a scavenger hunt with the English Language Program that I've been the planning person for all semester, and a pizza party afterwards. It's supposed to be over 90 degrees. I get even more tired just thinking about it.

But then, I only have to go in on Monday and Tuesday to do wrap-up stuff, and then I'm off to North Carolina to visit Tif for a week.

~*~

I got this email from Reina's mom this week (Reina was the child who cried for over half an hour the first day of class):

Dear Sally,

Thank you for your efforts to teach my daughter .
She does not speak English very well, but she loves to attend your class.

After she arrives back at home, she said that she had a good time.
She seems to be happy,while She is doing homework.
We are looking forward to your next lesson.

Sincerely,

Tamami I.
(Reina's mam)

We've come a long way. And Reina's learned a lot of English in just six weeks.

~*~

Link of interest, particularly for Mom: Strange Maps.

from the mouths of little children...

Yeah, I'm not that good about doing regular updates. Part of it is that my life just doesn't seem that exciting to me right now, and also, moving to Ann Arbor has been more of an adjustment than I realized it would be (it seems like the last six months or so have been nothing but major adjustments...this is wearying). I like my job a lot, but moving to a city where I don't know a lot of people (however, *wave* to Cary!) and I won't be here long enough to build long-term friendships has been challenging. But I have Ukrainian conversation time with Svitlana, think I may have found a church (two, actually) for the summer, and generally run up my phone bill. So I'm hanging in there.

And as I said, I really enjoy my job. The kids say the funniest things. Kay, one of my 4-year-olds, has a very stubborn streak to her...as well as a misunderstanding of reflexive pronouns. Last week, we were learning about feelings, and she said, "I angry." "Why are you angry?" I asked. "I angry because Daddy help me on monkey bars and I do it yourself!!!" She's very big on the phrase "I do it yourself."

Also from Ryan in the same class: "Who that?" (looking at the mailbox for a child who hadn't yet joined the class). "That's Mia," I said. "She's going to be the new girl." "Why we need new girl?" he asked.

My kids really are what keep me going some days. No matter how tired or drained or lonely I get, teaching them cheers me up!

oops, getting behind on posting

Oh, wow...it's been a week already since my last post! Let's see...what is there of note to mention?

* As of tonight, I officially have my apartment furnished, as Nikki and I hauled the futon upstairs and the couch downstairs. Forget "Two Men and a Truck"--two petite females proved that they're tougher than they look! I now hope to sort of get my living room put together and decorated. My chairs are fascinating and varied--a wooden folding chair, a very nice computer chair, a wooden stool, and a lopsided wicker chair I rescued off of the sidewalk this past weekend.

* I have a library card for the Ann Arbor Library. Besides books and movies, apparently you can check out art prints for a month or two. Maybe I should look into that for decorating.

* Reina, the little girl who just screamed and screamed the first few times in class, is fine now. Today she came in smiling, said "Hello," waved to her mom and said, "Bye-bye," and settled down to her art project. Her mom said that she gets all excited about coming to class. Yay!

* UMBC sent me a letter this week to tell me that I was accepted to the Bilingual Ed/ESOL MA program. I emailed them back in March to say I was withdrawing my application, but apparently some wires got crossed there. However, they apparently weren't going to give me any funding other than loans, so I think I'm much better off at MSU.

* After some emailing around, I have a Ukrainian conversation partner/tutor for the summer! Her name is Svitlana, and she's a student at Eastern Michigan who was originally from Ternopilska Oblast (not far from Celeste, actually). We met for the first time last night, and it was so much fun to be speaking Ukrainian again. With a job transcribing videos of Ukrainian classrooms this fall, I wanted to keep up with my language skills, so this seemed like a great opportunity.

shrug your shoulders and laugh...it beats the alternatives!

"Today was...interesting," I said to my mom on the phone tonight.

"Someone threw up?" she asked.

"Among other things," I answered. Apparently when you've worked in schools as long as she has, you just understand this stuff inherently.

So yes, I had a child throw up in class today (all over her Mother's Day card, which while it was unfortunate for the card, did make clean-up easier, as throwing away the card removed most of the mess). This was the same class where kids who had had indoor recess today at school still couldn't go outside due to rain so I had lots of antsy little boys, the electricity went off for a few seconds, and when it came back on, it set off the security alarm for the building, which the police had to come reset.

And did I mention that there was a parent in class today who had been concerned that her daughter was developmentally delayed and too young for the class and wanted to come observe? Of all the days to come... Fortunately, she seemed to be understanding about the chaos and see that in fact, her daughter was just fine. (She left right after the policeman...I don't know if her curiousity was satisfied or if she just couldn't take it anymore.)

Never a dull moment with this job.

the toughest job you'll ever love (no, not preschool)

I've taken to going for a walk most evenings, now that I've moved to Ann Arbor, a combination of wanting to get in better shape and become more familiar with the city. It's a beautiful place to be, especially in the spring. I walked for about 40 minutes tonight (partly because I wasn't quite sure where I was in relation to other things, as I kept finding intersections where both streets were labeled "South Something-or-other."

U of M's campus is lovely, especially the older buildings, many of which are Gothic in style. It reminds me a bit of my (quite possibly erroneous) conception of Oxford as an undergraduate fond of the works of Dorothy L. Sayers and C. S. Lewis, although I'm under the impression that Oxford has less "green space".

As I was walking by the Michigan Union tonight, I happened to notice a tall, thin, rectangular monument in the corner of a flower bed. Going over to read it, I found out that it commemorated the speech that John F. Kennedy made on the steps of the Michigan Union in 1960, campaigning for President, where he first mentioned the idea for the Peace Corps.

How many of you who are going to be doctors, are willing to spend your days in Ghana? Technicians or engineers, how many of you are willing to work in the Foreign Service and spend your lives traveling around the world? On your willingness to do that, not merely to serve one year or two years in the service, but on your willingness to contribute part of your life to this country, I think will depend the answer whether a free society can compete. I think it can! And I think Americans are willing to contribute. But the effort must be far greater than we have ever made in the past.

be not dismayed, whate'er betide--God will take care of you

I feel richly blessed with furniture tonight (and exhausted from moving it). The guy in the apartment above me moved out today, and he told me that I could have any of the furniture he left behind. So I have a couch (still up there, until I dispose of the futon I had), a table, a coffee table, a TV with DVD player built in, a stool, a computer desk chair, and a really, really nice mattress and box springs. Nikki, the girl across the hall, helped me move it all downstairs.

So, for having picked a place more or less at random off of Craigslist, this apartment has worked out to be a really good deal. Not overly expensive, good neighborhood, and now, lots of furniture for free.

Teaching...it's a lot of work, but I'm enjoying it. I have two classes of 2 to 3 1/2-year-olds, who come with a parent, one class of 3 1/2 to 5-year-olds, and one class of 4 1/2 to 6-year-olds. I'm sure I'll have lots of good teaching stories this summer, but tonight I'm too tired for them. As I said to Mom on the phone, I didn't go for a walk tonight, but I think I still got my exercise in.

home sweet apartment

I think the last post should have ended, "And when my life gets sort of settled, I'll try and start blogging again more regularly." As it turned out, I spent close to a week and a half (minus the weekend) living in a motel before moving into my apartment for the summer on Wednesday. Wednesday was also my first actual teaching day, with four classes; as well, I had horrible allergies. I basically managed to get the bed made and call Mom and Tif before falling asleep.

My apartment is great. It's part of a huge old brick house that's been turned into a bunch of apartments, largely populated by grad and law students. It's a little shabby in a good sort of way, with wood floors and detail around the doorways. The apartment itself is pretty small. It's got the same amount of rooms as my place in Ukraine--living room, kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom, but the rooms are smaller. But it's big enough for me (although sorely lacking in counter space in the kitchen). The girl I'm subletting from left me her furniture (which I can keep after I move out), and I'm inheiriting several other items from the guy upstairs who's moving out, so it should be pretty cozy once I get things organized.

This was originally going to be a much longer post including a section on teaching, but since both Tif and Melissa called me during the composition, I think it's time to close for now.

hi from the other side of the state

My fortune cookie last night said, "You will make many changes before settling down happily." Considering how much my life has changed since December, I'd like to know how many more changes I have to make. Can I count any of the previous ones retroactively? :) At least I know I'll settle down at some point.

For any readers who haven't heard, I moved to Ann Arbor this past weekend to teach ESL preschool for U of M (yeah, I now work for the "other school") for the summer. It's all happened pretty fast--I emailed them my interview last Sunday, got called for an interview on Monday, drove down to Ann Arbor to interview on Wednesday, got the job on Thursday, helped coach the LHS Quiz Bowl team at the state tournament Friday and Saturday (we didn't win either of our games, but I think the kids had fun), moved to Ann Arbor on Sunday, and started orientation for work yesterday. Whew!

I'm excited about the job (ESL! little kids! Cary! real pay checks! not subbing!), and I look forward to a summer in Ann Arbor. It's supposed to have the most bookstores per capita of any city in the US...

And now that I don't see as many people as often, I might start blogging again more regularly.

ah-choo!

I think I'm getting sick, if a stuffed-up nose, lots of sneezing, and general weariness without cause are any indications. This probably means that I've got whatever my dad's had for the last week, so I may have the pleasure of being sick and nonproductive for quite some time, as it seems to stick with you. I certainly hope not.

Fun kid moment of the day: For March is Reading Month, I read We're Going on a Bear Hunt to my mom's preschool class. Stuffed-up as I am, I ended up sneezing, and one little girl said, "You can't do that at my school." Well, then...

Other than that, not much is going on. Today's book of choice is A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nasar about the mathematician John Nash (no, I haven't seen the movie yet, although we have it). The math is going waaay over my head, but Nash's life itself is interesting. Although I think he's better in a book than he would have been in person.

I've updated my resume and sent it off to a couple of places for summer work, one which already told me that they filled all their openings but I could send it anyway in case someone decided not to accept the position, and the other one, a long shot that isn't sure if they'll have a position or not (but wow, would it be a neat place to work!). So we'll see what happens...I keep looking for jobs.

Barack Obama on Ukraine

I've been on a voracious reading kick lately, primarily non-fiction. The last couple of days I've been reading Barack Obama's The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream, which contains his views on American politics. It's been a good read, and probably deserves its own post with my reactions to it, but that will have to wait until I've processed my thoughts a bit more.

However, there was a hilarious passage about a trip he took to Ukraine as a senator in 2005 that I want to share with you. At least, hilarious to anyone who's been in Ukraine for any length of time... (I should also mention that a meal he had in Russia consisted of borscht, vodka, potato stew, and a "deeply troubling fish Jell-O mold." I didn't know that kholodets had a fish version...)

And in a quiet, residential neighborhood of Kiev, we received a tour of the Ukraine's version of the Centers for Disease Control, a modest three-story facility that looked like a high school science lab. At one point during our tour, after seeing windows open for lack of air-conditioning and metal strips crudely bolted to door jambs to keep out mice, we were guided to a small freezer secured by nothing more than a seal of string. A middle-aged woman in a lab coat and surgical mask pulled a few test tubes from the freezer, waving them around a foot from my face and saying something in Ukrainian.

"That is anthrax," the translator explained, pointing to the vial in the woman's right hand. "That one," he said, pointing to the one in the left hand, "is the plague."

I looked behind me and noticed Lugar [another senator] standing toward the back of the room.

"You don't want a closer look, Dick?" I asked, taking a few steps back myself.

"Been there, done that," he said with a smile.

theology in the classroom

My best quote from subbing this week is sort of an inverse of last week's "churchy" comment, and comes from one of my Quiz Bowl kids, a freshman who is reminiscent of Oleh Yukhymets in several ways, not least being the ability to know what buttons to push to drive me crazy quickly.

I was subbing for a science class on Wednesday, when I had to get after the student in question for reading when he was supposed to be doing something else (yes, Pot, meet Kettle). I confiscated his book, and was reading my own book, when he complained that it wasn't fair that I got to read when he didn't.

"Your job is to do your review sheet," I said. "My job is to make sure that you do that."

"Our job," he said, "is to praise the Almighty."

*snort*

And how could I argue with that?

Never a dull moment, subbing...

flannery o'connor quote

In honor of Flannery O'Connor's birthday (thank you, Writer's Almanac on NPR), a quote from one of her letters that Professor Dorr read to my Religion in American Literature class during my undergrad days.

Flannery O’Connor to Alfred Corn, May 30, 1962:

"As a freshman in college you are bombarded with new ideas, or rather pieces of ideas, new frames of reference, an activation of the intellectual life which is only beginning, but which is already running ahead of your lived experience. After a year of this, you think you cannot believe. You are just beginning to realize how difficult it is to have faith and the measure of a commitment to it, but you are too young to decide you don’t have faith just because you feel you can’t believe. About the only way we know whether we believe or not is by what we do, and I think from your letter that you will not take the path of least resistance in this matter and simply decide that you have lost your faith and that there is nothing you can do about it. […] If you want your faith, you have to work for it. […] For every book you read that is anti-Christian, make it your business to read one that presents the other side of the picture. […] Don’t think that you have to abandon reason to be a Christian. […] To find out about faith, you have to go to the people who have it and you have to go to the most intelligent ones if you are going to stand up intellectually to agnostics and the general run of pagans that you are going to find in the majority of people around you. […] Even in the life of a Christian, faith rises and falls like the tides of an invisible sea. It’s there, even when he can’t see it or feel it, if he wants it to be there. You realize, I think, that it is more valuable, more mysterious, altogether more immense than anything you can learn or decide upon in college. Learn what you can, but cultivate Christian skepticism. It will keep you free—not free to do anything you please, but free to be formed by something larger than your own intellect or the intellects of those around you."

churchy?

Latest story from Sal's days as a substitute teacher:

Today, I subbed for a high school math teacher. First hour was a class full of students who were all taking Algebra 1. For the second time. So they were rather less than enthused about the subject, and I had to keep getting after them.

Fifteen minutes or so into class, one girl in the front row pipes up, "Do you go to church?"

Me, bewildered: "Yes, why?"

Girl, snottily: "You seem like one of those really churchy people."

Me: ...

Still not sure if it was the cross necklace or the request for polite behavior that did it.

It makes me sad, though, that she associated Christianity with someone telling her to behave. I just finished reading unChristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks about Christianity... and Why It Matters by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons (they're connected to Barna, a group which researches issues connected to Christianity), which talks about some of the assumptions that nonChristians in their teens and twenties think about Christians--that they're judgmental, anti-homosexual, hypocritical, too political and sheltered, among other things. Some of this is because that the Christian message is, in fact, difficult to accept (sin and things like that are never popular), but more of it is because as Christians, we really are acting this way a lot of the time. The book really made me think about how I come across to people, and I would hope that people wouldn't associate those characteristics with me.

So it makes me sad that this girl probably looked at me and thought, "Oh, another one of those Christians" today.

decision made

Well, today was one of those days where I didn't know whether to be encouraged or discouraged at various points, but it ended well.

Quiz Bowl practice was fun...I'm coaching the varsity team this weekend at a tournament at MSU. I think they're not going to do stupendously well, but they're quite excited about going, between getting to play Quiz Bowl, dress up (it's all girls, so we decided to go dressy as opposed to wearing the team shirts), and get ice cream at Coldstone Creamery (I suggested that they actually eat lunch as well, but they haven't sounded as excited about that).

Then I came home and called 41 different school districts about their summer migrant education programs. Two said that they'd send me applications for a paraprofessional position (thanks to No Child Left Behind, I'm not qualified for a teaching position due to lack of certification, even though I have teaching experience). Several more said that they don't know what their funding's going to look like for the summer, but I can call back in April. Quite a few more said that they either wouldn't have openings or didn't have a summer program. And I left a lot of phone messages for people. It was not an encouraging afternoon, except that I was able to cross a lot of options off my "Plans for Summer" list.

But then I checked my email and found out that I've officially been offered a research assistantship for MSU this fall, 10 hours a week for a professor who wants me to transcribe data in Ukrainian and 10 hours a week for another prof as of yet to be determined. It'll cover tuition, plus a stipend. So I finally made up my mind...I'm going to be a Spartan again! I'm excited; the pieces have really fallen into place here.

subbing and shoes

Subbed two days for high school English this week. It was better than science because 1) we watched a movie with a plot (granted, it was Signs, which I was not all that impressed with, but it was at least a plot), and 2) the classes that didn't watch a movie were working in the library, so I could read books. However, I had my first student use profanity while talking to me. Not swearing at me, per se, but using profanity to describe the project she was working on.

Me: Excuse me, but that language isn't necessary.
Student: Well, you don't have to be snotty about it.

I left her teacher a lovely note. Also, I described one student as "goodnaturedly unproductive." He thought that was a good phrase for me to use.

Tonight one of the women from church who's about my age had a bunch of people--family members, friends, and church women--over for a clothes and accessories swap. Unfortunately, most people had brought clothes that weren't my size, but I still did pretty well. I got two summer tops, a pair of earrings, a really pretty cross necklace (blue stones and sterling silver), and three pairs of shoes. The shoes made me pretty thrilled, which amuses me, as I never used to be a shoe person (and I'm still not, for the most part). I have a pair of black clogs, a pair of brown clogs, and a pair of clunky brown leather lace-up shoes that I'm quite pleased with.

Frank McCourt, Jesse Stuart, and Me

I spent three days this week subbing for a science teacher at the high school I graduated from. It was three days of showing videos five class periods a day, often the same videos for each class. I read a lot of books this week. I also found out the difference between light and dark meat.

Random thoughts from the week:

1. I felt a repeated urge to give many of the boys I taught haircuts. I'm sorry, but the long, shaggy look is not one I particularly care for.
2. It really bothers me to hear the kids say, "Oh, I don't have a big vocabulary. I'm from Lakeview," as if being from Lakeview is an excuse for ignorance. I replied, "Well, I'm also from Lakeview," and they mumbled something about being slackers. Aargh. No, we don't have the best economic situation. No, we don't have all the resources that larger, "better" schools have. But that's no excuse. You can't blame your lack of motivation simply on your location or your resources.
3. I didn't realize how much I enjoy coaching my Quiz Bowl kids until I subbed at the high school level. Part of it is yes, that they are more academic in nature. Another part of it is that, unlike subbing for younger grades, teens are more stand-offish with a sub, and therefore it's a lot harder to connect with the kids I was subbing for than it's been with elementary-age kids, who mostly interact with subs pretty well, or with my Quiz Bowlers, who know me.

Two of the (many) books I read this week were Frank McCourt's memoir Teacher Man, which chronicles his teaching career in New York City during the latter part of the 20th century, and Jesse Stuart's The Thread That Runs So True, about his years as a teacher and administrator in rural Kentucky during the '20s and '30s. Both were good reads and gave me hope that it is possible to teach high schoolers effectively, even though that's not necessarily the easiest age group for me to work with. What really stuck out to me in both of them is that to reach high schoolers (or any age group), you have to be creative, rather than hum-drum. That may sound obvious, but I recommend both books as ways of showing how to be creative effectively.

That's the problem with subbing. There is no way to show 15 class periods of videos effectively!

nadiya yea (there is hope)

I'm posting from my house!!! The roads were icy today and I didn't really feel like driving into town to use the library (which may or may not be open) to email in my newspaper article, so after much trial and error, Dad and I managed to hook my laptop up to our dial-up connection. It's not the fastest connection, but it's faster on my computer than my parents', and I can access Blogger and don't have to deal with flash drives.

In other news, I'm tired of winter, have been rearranging my room a bit, don't know what I'm doing or where I'm living this summer (but it's probably not here, as my primary source of income around here ends when school gets out, and I'd relocate sooner if I found something better), and there's a chance that if I go to MSU this fall, I could get a job transcribing data in Ukrainian for a professor in the department I'd be in.

for your interest/amusement/something to do

The rest of my time in Lansing was much less uneventful, thank goodness. This week I've been substitute teaching, and today the Quiz Bowl team I'm coaching has a match up to Chippewa Hills, so I'm driving up there in a bit. I get to drive the JV team home, so that should be...um...exciting. Hopefully not too much so.

Since I don't seem to have particularly interesting posts these days, mostly due to the lack of Blogger access at home/lots of thinking going on in my head that's not so postable/my suspicion that maybe you aren't all dying to hear of my adventures with rolled fondant in cake decorating class (so much fun!), here's a survey to entertain you all.

A) Four jobs I have had in my life:
Supervisor for MSU summer cleaning crew, TEFL teacher with Peace Corps, reporter for the Lakeview Area News, substitute teacher

There is no B). I don't know why.

C) Places I have lived:
Lakeview, MI; East Lansing, MI; Zgurivka, Ukraine; Balaklia, Ukraine

D) TV Shows that I watch:
1. LOST
2. right now, that's it

E) People who e-mail me (semi-regularly):
1. Jason
2. Tif
3. Facebook :)

F) Four of my favorite foods:
1. fettuccine alfredo
2. homemade bread
3. blueberry pie with graham cracker crust
4. plov (homesick for UA alert!)

G) Four places I would rather be right now:
1. Milwaukee
2. Balaklia
3. any place with warmer weather and no snow
4. East Lansing/although here's not that bad

H) Four friends that I think will respond: meh. Feel free to, or not, as it suits you.

I) Things I am looking forward to:
1. the weekend after this one (Jason visiting/my birthday)
2. spring!!!
3. grad school

"you had the world's smallest nail stuck in your tire..."

Yesterday was a day I don't need to repeat again any time soon.

It started out with me packing my car for a trip to East Lansing to visit the MA TESOL program.

Then, I got a mile away from my house and decided, "Oh, I'll just take this extra half mile of dirt road to get me to the highway, which will be cleared, rather than go on snowy paved roads for several miles." This started well, and I was within an eighth of a mile of my goal, when the sheet of ice that I was driving on became problematic. I slid and spun off into the snowbank...and got a flat tire in the process.

Thank goodness for cell phones, random strangers driving by, and fathers.

Close to two hours later, I was on my way again. I got to MSU only about 20 minutes later than I needed to be there (I'd originally scheduled plenty of time beforehand to do random things). I sat in on a class, had an interview for a TA position, and had a very good conversation with Professor Ron Dorr, who I'd had for Religion and American Literature and was one of the two best professors I had at MSU.

Then I went back to my car, intending to head to Quiz Bowl practice and see people. However, to my utter dismay, I discovered that in my rush to not be quite-as-late when I showed up, I had inadvertently locked my keys in the car.

Called H&H Mobile, got it taken care of, and eventually made it to Quiz Bowl practice. Then I went to Tina and Lisa's, where I'm staying this weekend, exhausted after a stressful day. Within ten minutes of arriving, Tina had a pillow, a cup of tea, and a back rub for me. Bless her heart!

Although, as my mom said, no car trouble and a bad interview would have been much worse.

~*~

I'd forgotten how much I love the Lansing area and the MSU campus. I don't know for sure what I'm doing this fall yet, but it's been great to be back here for a few days.

Movie Review: Juno

Last Friday night, a fifteen-year-old friend and I drove to Mount Pleasant to see Juno, a comedy about a sixteen-year-old girl who finds herself pregnant. We both really enjoyed the movie, and it's stuck with me enough over the past week to do a quick review.

What really impressed me about the movie (besides the superb acting jobs, witty dialogue, and catchy soundtrack) was how affirming the movie was of the value of life ("sanctity of life" is a stretch, but I'll take what I can get). Christianity Today's review talks of it's "implicitly pro-life—not 'anti-choice,' but certainly pro-life—sensibilities," and that sums it up about right. The eponymous heroine of Juno considers aborting her baby, but seeing a classmate (who I think was ESL) picketing outside the abortion clinic who tells her, "Your baby has fingernails!" changes her mind...when she goes inside, all she can notice are everyone's fingernails, and she leaves in a hurry.

Juno's not cut out to be a teen mom, though, she decides, and so she gives the baby up for adoption. The adoptive parents are human through and through, and there are several twists and turns before the story ends, showing that though people are flawed, good can come out of difficult situations.

Apart from enjoying the movie myself, I felt that it did a good job of promoting a pro-life message to a secular culture. Although staunchly pro-life myself, I'm a realist, and I don't see legislation changing anything on the highly polarized issue of abortion until people see it as unthinkable. Juno doesn't present abortion as unthinkable, but it shows life--and adoption--as a better option. To quote Christianity Today again, "Life is life, and deserves to be nurtured, even—if not especially—when everything around it is broken."

Plus, the movie opened up a good discussion about abortion, temptation, and adoption on the way home, which is always a good plus.

Rating: **** (out of 5)

very quick post

Moving to a warmer climate at some point is really tempting right now. We've spent the last few days in the single to negative digits, with wind chills well below zero. I visited some of my friends from high school this weekend down in Grand Rapids (hi, Heather!), only to end up there a bit longer than I'd expected due to not being able to get back home. However, there were a lot worse places that I could have ended up, as we ordered pizza and played Wii bowling, Dance Dance Revolution, and Settlers of Catan, which is like a cross between Risk and Monopoly. I'd played it once in college, but finally understood how it works this time and had a LOT of fun.

brrr

It's cold here in Michigan.

The job search continues, with various amusing suggestions from friends and acquaintances--everything from teaching at a Bible college in Kentucky to becoming a sports writer for the local paper. I've submitted my paperwork to sub at local schools, have two days scheduled next week to sub at the Christian school connected to my parents' church (my church, I suppose, now that I'm living here again), and another potential job that I'm not going into details about here because the family consensus was that one of my readers would think it highly entertaining if they found out in some other fashion. (Yes, it's legal.)

On the grad school front, I found out yesterday that I've been accepted to MSU's MATESOL program for the fall. I'm not making any decisions yet, as I haven't heard from UMBC and won't find out if I have a TA position at MSU until March, but it's great to know! I'm hoping to visit the department next month when I'm down for some Quiz Bowl stuff, so that should be good.

I've recently found Ukrainian-themed scrapbook paper online, so I hope to start working on my Peace Corps scrapbook soon. Maybe that will help organize all the piles of stuff I have around my desk.

On the subject of Ukraine, here's a good article about evangelicalism in Ukraine from Christianity Today.

Also on the subject of Ukraine, I made the mistake of listening to some of my Russian hymns last night and I got really really homesick. I guess it's part of the readjustment process, but it stinks. If I don't listen to my music and watch my DVDs (which I can't do right now because my disk drive won't open), I'll forget my language. But when I do, I just really start to remember how much I loved Ukraine and how much I miss it.

It's really cold these days. At least here, I don't have to walk everywhere like I would in Ukraine.

not-a-post

This is not a real post. That would involve having more time. But I wanted to let you all know that the Farm Service Agency job didn't work out, so it looks like I'll be subbing unless something else comes up.

At some point, I may post about living a counter-cultural lifestyle, as several books I've been reading and an on-going discussion I've been having have been related to that topic. So my question to you, faithful readers: how would you define living counter-culturally? In what ways do you think you do so, and in what ways would you like to?

ps The Texas hill country is beautiful, even in January. And I ate ice cream outside in 60 degree weather on Sunday!

Take that, Michigan winters!

howdy, y'all

Quick update from Austin, Texas, where we're all busy with pre-wedding stuff:

~It's great to be with Melissa and Liz. We had a trip down Quote Book Memory Lane yesterday afternoon, and already have several new entries, i.e. "Sally now comes with hair care products" (Melissa).
~The job interview went well as far as the person I was interviewing with said he thought I'd be a good person for the job, but the problem is that while it's a temporary position, they're hoping to extend it past the point where I'd be heading off for grad school. So it's possible but unlikely that I'll get it. Let's hear it for subbing!
~I'm breaking in my new shoes for the wedding today, having realized that that was smarter than waiting until Saturday. Ow...
~Texas trees are a lot shorter than Michigan ones. And a lot less stuff is built out of wood.

For LiveJournal Readers

Courtesy of my friend Liz, this blog now has an RSS feed for LiveJournal for anyone who wants to follow along with me that way. http://syndicated.livejournal.com/bookaholicgirl2/profile

That's all, really. Oh, and I have a job interview for a technical assistant position at the Farm Service Agency down to Stanton on Thursday. Here's hoping!

First Post!

Welcome, readers! Some of you may know me from my Sal In Ukraine days...some of you may be new readers, and I'm happy to meet all of you. I'm an almost-twenty-five-year-old, former English major from Michigan State University, Returned Peace Corps Volunteer (Ukraine), politically a swing voter (I'm quite conservative on some issues and liberal on others, so I end up testing as a moderate, but I'm not sure I am), daughter, friend, girlfriend, and evangelical Christian in the Wesleyan/Holiness tradition with a bit of Baptist and Bible churches thrown in. Oh, and hopeless bookworm. I currently am having trouble accessing Blogger on my home computer, so updates will be sort of irregular and dependent on how much else I need to get done on the library computers when I'm here.

Amusing bits from moving back home to a small town in mid-Michigan:

I called the township clerk the other day to get an absentee ballot, as I'll be out of town on the day of the primaries, due to being a bridesmaid in a friend's wedding down in Texas. He asked for my name and address, and then said, "Who do you belong to?"

"Well, actually, I'm an independent..."

He laughed. "No, I was asking whose daughter you are!"

"Oh, I'm Charlie and Mary's girl."

Nice to be home in so many ways. Also nice that my dress alterations for Melissa's wedding cost me a grand total of $6. When I was in a wedding a couple of years ago and did my alterations down in Lansing, they cost me $40.