Grind, A Confession and Beowulf

Here we are at "It's a Grind," our favorite local cafe. I'd like to pretend it's a dive, but it's really not and, right now, the only "divey" thing about it is the sea of coffee filtering around at my feet, remnants of what once inhabited this bright, beautiful, huge red mug Dustin was drinking coffee out of. That, too, is smashed. Ladies and gentlemen, let me re-introduce myself as one of the world's biggest klutzes. In all fairness, the catastrophic blow to the mug was not entirely my fault, since Dustin placed it directly behind my laptop, out of my line of sight. How could he know I'd turn my computer and send the mug flying? How could I know the mug was even there? Que sera sera.

We've come to this cafe in an attempt to refocus our attentions on schoolwork. For Dustin's part, he has been diligently reading books as if his brain has an unappeasable, ravenous appetite for them. I have been alternating between reading for my first week of teaching next week and revising my memoir. While we've both been rather dedicated, the semester will, no doubt, be hectic and even us studious, academic-types need a break from the same old setting; our home office filled with so many books it makes me dizzy just thinking about them. In fact, just before we left the house, we were fitting a place for a suspended bookshelf to reside in the office since we need space for, you know, more books!

Yesterday I began reading Beowulf which I am teaching the first and second week of the semester for my Intro to Brit Lit class. It was originally written in Old English and when I read the introduction, I found myself trying to memorize the symbols of Old English and what they sounded like so I could teach myself to read in Old English (my bf Megan can do this and I'm totally envious...literary nerds!). In my mind, it should work like those decoder rings from Cracker Jax boxes or those scrambled coded clues they provide on the Geocaching page that look like this. If I keep the symbols and their meanings beside the text, I should be able to translate no problem, right? But this is crazy talk and more introductory reading proves my theory to be impossible. It's a good thing the text I'm teaching has been translated. The big confession here is this (lean in closely because it's a secret)...I've never read Beowulf.

Has the initial shock worn off? I think everyone and their mother has read this text but me. Somehow, in the advanced lit class I took in high school, we skipped this stuff and worked with modern authors and poetry instead. In college, my creative writing major called for craft, workshop and critical courses rather than literature courses and I think my final lit course tally by the end of four years came in at four (two required, two for my film minor). When I divulged this to my husband, his brother admitted that he, too, had never read it. (It can slide with him, though, since he's not an English Lit. professor.) So D launched into a basic summary using the following words, phrases and definitions:

mead hall: place where men drink honey wine (aka-mead) and where they pass out; created by the king for the people (there was a lot more to this, but I'm going for "short" here)
King Hrothgar
Grendel: some sort of fucked up monster whose arms is ripped off by our hero, leading to his eventual death
tears limbs off drunk people: what Grendel does at night by sneaking into the hall when the people are passed out
Grendel's Mom: even more fucked up than Grendel who resides in a cozy cave and is really pissed off when her son dies (bitch should've headed Beowulf's threats...this is my additional commentary, not the husband's)
Beowulf: an arrogant warrior type who eventually becomes king; when he first busts on the scene he brags about swimming for hella long time, like twenty days, and to put his money where his mouth is, he brings down both Grendel and his mom (almost single-handedly). However, he later becomes king, but is more of a fighter than a thinker, the kingdom's not at its peak, a dragon is threatening the well-being of the land and Beowulf takes some guys, fights the dragon, becomes mortally wounded and dies. Oh, and only one guy stays with him to finish off the dragon, but the kingdom benefits from this dragon's death.
The End 

I considered whipping out our mini voice recorder and getting this all on tape to play to my class next week, but thought better of it, not wanting them to think this summary would suffice and they'd no longer have to do the work of reading. Sigh. One thing his summary did accomplish, though, is getting me stoked to read Beowulf. I haven't gotten past the introduction quite yet, but will let you know how it goes. Plus, we have a bottle of mead wine at home that I'm now dying to try out (I've been eyeing it between revisions and home-upkeep).

Have any of you read Beowulf? What'd you think?

Good Fortune and Safety to All Who Enter Here

My brother-in-law recently visited our home for the first time and christened it as being both "calm and peaceful." He commented on liking the greenish hued paint and said he thought the house suited us well. Coming from Coire (pronounced "Corey"), this is a huge compliment. It's not because Coire doesn't offer compliments often; it's because he is something of an inherent interior designer. As Dustin says, "Coire can come into a room, decide that a red stripe needs to be painted vertically down the wall and when he's done it, it looks really good and you're left wondering how the hell a random red line down a wall could work. Somehow, he just has a knack for it. He just knows what will look good." 

This can be proven by merely stepping foot into Coire's own home. There is a fluidity to the setup and furniture, a cool feel to the rocky-faced living room tabletops and tan leather couches that makes one think of an Asian rock garden, carefully crafted. At one point, there was a rock-fountain against the wall that seemed to whisper "serenity" and the home felt like nature domesticated. There is something about the way Coire views the world that allows him to take something otherwise bland and boring and make it pop. I often think if I were to simply name an emotion, Coire could design any room to portray it perfectly.

Coire's also quite observant and one of the few, if not the only, people to have commented on the swastika that can be found on the floor at every entrance of our home (image to the right). Most people don't notice it since the sticker is quite small and blends in with the tile beneath it, not to mention most people aren't looking at the ground when they enter a house. My brothers each wear a gold necklace with a swastika pendant that stays tucked into their shirts, but my eldest brother told me he has nearly gotten into fights with people who don't understand the true meaning behind the symbol. When Coire mentioned it, I feared he might think I was a Nazi-sympathizer or racist so I explained the origin behind the symbol.

The swastika is a Hindu religious symbol (it might also be good to note that Hindus are pacifists), second in strength only to the Om. It comes from the Sanskrit "svasti" meaning "good fortune" and is common in India. Various translations can be "good fortune," "auspiciousness," "harmony" or "welcome," among others. To stereotype, Indians tend to be fairly superstitious and when I moved into my home, my father put an "Om" above two of the three doors and a swastika at the main entrance, telling me that it would keep me safe and protect the house. I, for my own part, am superstitious, as well, but became more superstitious when "friends" would "let themselves in" (translate to: break into) my house, but always through the side entrance, the one without a swastika or Om. After coming back from a trip to India, I stuck an Om and swastika at the remaining entrance, the one people used to let themselves in through, and have since had no break-ins. (Hence, my superstition was gratified.)

Coire's logical next question was, why did Hitler take and use the swastika? The answer: because he thought it was a symbol of racial purity and superiority, perpetuated by the speculation that early Indian inhabitants were white invaders. So Hitler took this Aryan symbol and used it to represent his ideal, as well as playing on the idea of "harmony" (believing the world would be harmonious under his rule and the extinction of Jews...etc.). In doing so, he re-defined a revered religious symbol meaning harmony and good fortune to be recognized, instead, as a symbol of hatred and genocide.

We both agreed this was a sad result for a peaceful symbol.

When Coire left, he took an extra swastika with him to place on the floor at the entrance of his home and I couldn't help but feel as though we'd taken something back somehow, by spreading the symbol and using it for good. I just hope the rest of the world can follow the same pacifist, harmonious suit.

The Good List

It's so long, 2009, and hello 2010, but not without a nod toward all the blessings the year brought. So without further adieu, the Good List (on a personal level) of 2009.

1. The Michael Family Established 2009: Welcome to our love. June 13, 2009 was the day Dustin and I joined together in marriage with 130 of our friends and family as our witnesses. There was never a more perfect day and each day feels as new and exciting as the last. We were so blessed to have so many people travel from extreme distances to be there to celebrate with and join us in our special day. In fact, we had so much fun, we plan on doing it again every few years in varying locations. I'm so thrilled to have married my best friend and love of my life. 

2. The Passing of my Comprehensive Exams/Attaining ABD:  What a long, hard trip it's been! For the last four years, I've been preparing for this exam, in some ways. For the last year, I've been reading as many books as I could possibly get into me while taking careful, detailed notes on every aspect of them in preparation. All semester, I wrote a preparatory essay (with one major, overhaul revision), then I sat for two hours for an oral exam with my intelligent and knowledgeable committee. One catch, one of my members was sick, so I had to come back and sit for another hour-long oral exam with he and my committee chair a few days later. The consensus: unanimous passes. Again, my thanks to the committee, my family and husband who, as my mom put it, "was there in the trenches" with me. So much support for one girl is more than I could have imagined.

3. Sara's Engagement: Woah there, little Sara! Who knew my sister would be getting engaged only six months after Dustin and I married!?! Sara had been dating her boyfriend for 2 years and eight months before they got engaged. Her newly minted fiance got her parents and his parents to the same restaurant so after he proposed, the host asked them to move to another table. Sara freaked out a little bit, but agreed to move...and voila! They were moved to a table where their parents were. Anthony's a great guy who loves my sister very much. So congrats to the two of them and thanks for asking me to be your Maid of Honor! :) What an honor it is.

4. Cousin Rachel's Admission to Law School...at MIZZOU: This is pretty exciting news since we go to Mizzou and Rachel will be JUST down the street from us. Rachel is Dustin's first cousin. She has been wanting to go to law school forever and applied early admission to no other schools and now...she's in! A dream come true! Congrats, Rachel! We are so proud of you and excited to have you at Mizzou!

5. Coire Graduates: My brother-in-law, Coire, manages a local gas station, raises his 7 year-old daughter, had an internship and took on full course loads every semester until finishing up his bachelor's degree this December. It hasn't been an easy task, but Coire has completed it nobly and we are incredibly proud of him and all of his hard work.

6. Health: 2009 was a year without death or serious sickness in our family (both Navare and Michael sides). We feel blessed that our family is growing with marriages and births and we are thrilled at the blessings of continued health we have.

As 2010 is at hand, we greet it with joy and hope. Dustin will be taking his comprehensive exams this year; we will both be looking for tenure track and spousal appointments. Sara will be preparing for her wedding. Rachel will be moving away from home for the first time and taking on law school. Coire will be on the job market. We hope for nothing more than continued health, love and success for all of our friends and family and thank you all for coming along for the ride.

Here's to 2010!

3am Rambling

It's nearing 3am and I just can't find a pathway to sleep this evening. D and I spent most of the day watching season five of The Office and had some wonderful stop-in visitors earlier in the day, as well. Who knew Sunday would be so lively at our house? Mainly, we wanted to stay in and have a lazy Sunday to recuperate from the crazy high we've been on all week long! Let me recap...

Monday: First round of oral comps from 2-4pm straight: passed!!!!!
Tuesday: Last official day of class with my students, Christmas shopping, dissertation reading of our darling friend A. who is hopefully reading this and feeling incredibly wonderful about his fabulous manuscript! Great job, A! Followed by a celebratory drink with the chair of my committee.
Wednesday: Coldest day that ever existed, D's last day of class...I attended and helped out a bit/
Thursday: Non-mandatory meet-up/critique with one class, conferences with students, second round of comps (nope, this is not the norm. One of my committee members was sick on Monday so we--the chair of my committee and the sick committee member--sat down and did an hour long Q&A which I passed, thank God).
Friday: More conferences with students, Christmas party, one of my best friend's here came home from the hospital (woohooo!!!)....and we got the incredible news that my SISTER GOT ENGAGED at dinner that night to her sweet boyfriend of three years, Anthony. Congrats to them!
Saturday: Em's birthday celebration, thank you cards from our wedding (we waited for wallet sized pics and started writing them asap when we got them last week, finally!) and Christmas cards mostly finished up, then even MORE good news that D's cousin Rachel got into Mizzou Law School (early admission) and will be joining us up here in Columbia next school year!

Can you see why we needed a bit of a rest come Sunday? Not to mention, I've been sick all week (longer than a week now) and it sucks. After a full day today, we had one more wonderful surprise: a call from D's best friend Andy who is working in a military base somewhere abroad. He left two months ago and will be back for a brief visit in early 2010, but we miss him and were very happy to get word straight from him that all's well.

Usually I survey a year near the end and think, "Man, I hope next year's better than this shit." But, honestly, this is one year that is going to be nearly impossible to top. Two of my happiest moments ever have occurred this year: marrying D and passing my comps. How can any other year top that???

Except, I can't sleep at the moment, with all the thoughts of having free time again to write and read at my leisure and take more classes for fun (yeah, I said that..."for fun"). I'm just so excited I don't want to waste my time sleeping, I guess. So, instead, I'm wasting it writing a crappy blog that you will now be subject to reading. Sorry. I'm going to try this sleep thing again. I've heard if you lay there long enough it eventually comes...eventually.

xoxo
N

The Outcome

"There's this memory I have of being twelve-ish and believing that one day soon, I'd be a ballerina. So I stood in the kitchen on the wooden floor and practiced tour jetes while my Mom cooked dinner. More than likely, she had her back to me, tired of watching me attempt to beat the height of my last backward, twirling kick leap. I tour jeted back and forth on the kitchen floor, occasionally saying "Did you see that? How high I got?" Thinking that the higher and I leapt, the better dancer I had become. Mom finally turned to watch me when I kicked and twirled, landing on my right foot, extending my left back and upward just as my eldest brother walked into the kitchen. "You nearly kicked me in the balls, Neesha! Watch it!" he shouted. I don't remember what happened after this, but my brother tells the story differently. Instead of leaping and landing gracefully, he contends that he came into the room and bore the brunt of that last leg extension. He swears my left leg came up steadily and kicked him straight in the balls. For years we told this story differently--he with the injured groin, me with the near-catastrophic kick. For him, it perpetuated the stereotype that I was a klutz, that bad luck followed me and reigned down on anyone who had the misfortune of standing or being too close to me; for me, it was the difference between truth and embellishment. Finally, a year ago, I asked my mother if she remembered the incident. If I did, in fact, kick my brother in the groin. I needed to know what the truth of the matter really was...whether I could've altered my recollection of the experience so greatly that I'd forgotten I endangered my brother's ability to have children. "No. I don't recall you kicking him," she admitted. "I remember him being indignant because you could have. But I don't remember it actually happening," she concluded without hesitation or second-guessing. This is the fault of memory," I explained to my doctoral committee Monday afternoon in an attempt to further support my discussion on the faultiness, yet validity of memory.

Incase you were wondering, I passed my comprehensive oral examination. I am humbled by being able to admit that and as proud as my modesty can permit. I cannot believe I've accomplished this feat. I cannot believe I have somehow been able to have a prosperous life on top of accomplishing this feat. I am in a state of constant awe and gratitude. I don't know how to begin to express how happy and relieved I feel or how grateful I am to all those who have helped me get to this place, who have supported me and believed in me. So, please accept my thanks and appreciation for sticking with our blog in its poor state. It might take a new direction, but will, hopefully, house more actual writing now that this process is ended for me. We do have Dustin in the lineup to consider, though, so all the prayers and thoughts can be redirected his way.

Thanks for your thoughts and keep checking back for more blogs!

N

Brink

Today I find myself on the cusp of the most important exam of my life. In some ways, it literally feels like I'm standing at the top of a rocky cliff, about to step out. At best, the ground appears beneath me, invisible until I step like in that Indiana Jones movie where he has to have faith that he'll step out and something will be there. I think he tosses some dust, perhaps, to make that faith visible. I don't have that luxury. At worst, I step out and tumble, landing alive, but visibly shaken and dejected at the bottom with nothing but the cliff still there for me to climb just one more time.

Tomorrow is the oral part of my comprehensive exam. While I've passed the written part unanimously, I still have to find the words to articulate my thoughts gracefully to an audience of five, learned, intellectual committee members, each with their own questions and specialities in tact and sharpened, ready for discussion. In my heart, I know they want me to pass. I believe this. But in my mind, I am intensely aware of the fact that any one of them could trip me up unintentionally, causing me to stumble off that cliff instead of find solid grounding.

For weeks, years, really, I have been preparing for this day, this exam. It's the culmination of my academic life. Just mention "comprehensive exams" and typically stern and stubborn forces part ways, make exceptions, extend deadlines, knowingly. I can almost see the sympathy and feel the gentle pats on my hand from faculty members when I tell them, via email, I cannot produce a syllabus for next semester yet because my oral exam is on Monday. "I understand the anxiety that can come from this exam," they say. "Just get it to me when you can," they allot. "Let me know if there's anything we can do to make this easier." They, too, have been here. Their own recollections of the difficulty before me overwhelm them, I imagine, and they wish me luck, tell me not to worry about the syllabus and send no more emails to distract me from the task.

To this, I thank them all. Thank the teachers that have come before them and the ones before that. Thank my husband who has graciously taken on the upkeep of our lives. Who has patiently remained a true partner even when I was lost, before he married me and after. Thank, even, my pets for seeming to know and lying at my feet as warmers or company. Bust, mostly, I thank my parents and siblings who don't quite understand what this means or what it's like. Who have, certainly, felt frustration at the years spent moving from place to place, ever further from home. Who have remained, a constant nucleus of love and regenerative strength. Who have tried to understand the processes and tests, papers and explanations, meaningless to them, of "comprehensive exams" and "dissertation," the weight of the words falling on them, the reality of them still elusive. It is with great patience they have followed me on this path, supporting me without fully knowing what it all means. Joining me in wondering, when my sanity was tested, whether it was really going to be worth it, after all. Whether I'd make it out, in the most literal sense, alive. They have accepted what they could not understand through trusting that I was doing what I needed to do. They believed in this and me with blind faith.

Tomorrow, when it's all over, I will either be walking high above the cliff I've conquered or standing at the bottom, contemplating a new way to reach the top. Either way, I will be a stronger, better version of myself for taking that step with only my good strength and sense to guide me and the support of all those who will stick with me whether I rise or fall. I cannot consider myself anything other than the most blessed person I know.

What I Remember

In my MFA program back in Pittsburgh we read a lot of books and essays that mentioned or talked about Pittsburgh in a class I took. At the moment, I can't remember the class or what it's real focus was, but I do remember looking for Pittsburgh in the strangest of places. Tonight, while rereading Li-Young Lee's incredibly poetic memoir The Winged Seed, I was reminded of that search in various texts when I turned from page 77 to 78 and saw, in a black marker-like ink I have since abandoned in favor of a fine-pointed black ink, "Finally!" scrawled into the margin with an arrow pointing to the phrase "East Liberty." At the time, I must have been searching for Pittsburgh amidst the symbols of "seed" "R" "winter" "ash" but now, four years removed from my last reading of the text, what I remember most is a scene where the author describes removing excrement from his father's bowels because his body will no longer purge itself of it without aid.

For years, when someone sharing a table with me ordered salad at a restaurant, I have waited for the image of a man lifting limp leaf after limp leaf of lettuce from his plate, depositing it into his mouth while spouting poetic brilliance or dropping socially awkward conversation between leaves without remembering precisely where the notion of such a thing came from. A story someone told me? A memory from my past? Until I stumbled across the description in Sylvia Plath's Bell Jar this afternoon. This was her memory, her reality or fantasy and I felt such relief at having discovered the source of this expectation, the reason for why a plate of greenery triggered this hope.

These are some of the moments from literature that have remained with me like a sticker on an old notebook whose image was once complete but now remains only a probed, scratched, faded fragment of the whole. Part of it remains, unremovable, though much of it is gone and its true form is entirely obliterated.

As a child, I could read countless books and recite in great detail precisely what happened complete with character descriptions, thoughts, authors, and, often, page numbers. My mother likened me to a sponge, constantly absorbing whatever I came into contact with, often unconsciously remembering. If you gave me a title, I could respond with a complete encyclopedic, Cliffs Notes knowledge without thinking. This was a time time of untainted recollection, too soon in years for me to confuse experience with a story I'd read. I filled my mental library, devouring books alongside my dinner at the crowded table each night, and stayed up late to know the ending, guided only by the moonlight streaming in from my bedroom window. I simply had to know what happened to these characters, these lives so different and more fascinating than my own. And I remembered every detail as if it were my life.

In the last year, I have read over 150 books in an attempt to study for my comprehensive exams. The list should have ranged from about 110-125, but in the course of revamping it, many books I'd read were abandoned and new books I hadn't read filled their void. These titles are piled in towers on my desk, precariously shifting with the vaguest hint of breeze. I have sorted and separated them into categories according to subject, resorted them by theme, stacked them according to which of my four questions they applied to and started over in favor of how they related to one another, what theories they exemplified, which ones directly alluded to others and so on. Many have come to feel like limp leaves in my hands, my recollection of them like irretrievable waste from my insides, though I have known them all intimately, but cannot call them to mind the way I once did as a child on a whim or as a game.

When I go to bed at night, the last image I have is of those towers of books across the room, stacked high, waiting to be reorganized and remembered when the time comes for me to call upon them when asked. My fear is that when that time comes, they will only come back to me in flashes of lettuce leaves and stubborn bowels, just a single, blank remnant rather than a complete symbol or whole. Already I have forgotten entire plots, authors, characters. Already, life has filled me with memories competing for space, making themselves comfortable in the minute spaces of the card catalog compartment of my mind.