Sunday

WorldCon is over. I'm registered at Fourth Street Fantasy for next year and on the waitlist for World Fantasy this year. I bought the Laurie Edison ring (tourmaline and sterling silver, gorgeous) as a birthday gift to myself, but because she has to size it, I probably won't have it until after my birthday. Elsewhere in birthday land, I went to Inez' birthday party, thrown by several of her old friends in Reno, which featured a truly fantastic Day of the Dead birthday cake.

Tomorrow, Inez flies back to Iowa.

Many other people are already gone.

I'm both sad and relieved. For five days now, I've been on a little piece of My Planet. Now, most of My People are going home, and I have to resume the stranger-in-a-strange-land gig.

On the other hand, tomorrow I get to sleep in. And exercise again, which hasn't been possible during the con. And maybe get some writing done. I'm very glad I had the foresight to cancel my hospital shift tomorrow!

For the rest of this evening, I plan to be a vegetable.

WorldCon

This WorldCon has, at the very least, been wonderful for me. It may turn out to have been life-changing.

For one thing, I got to see all kinds of old friends, including my beloved former students Kurt Adams and Inez Schaechterle -- with whom I've hung out for much of the con -- and my editor/NYC buddies Ellen Datlow, David Hartwell and Patrick and Teresa Nielsen Hayden (most of whom have also edited me at one time or another).

I got very satisfying strokes for the panels I moderated, especially the one on "Faith and Science," which went very smoothly despite the potential for catastrophe. I went to excellent panels and presentations. I got a lot of knitting done.

But I also got a lot of very specific reinforcement about my own identity as a writer. For instance:

* At my first panel, someone showed up with, I swear, a copy of every book and story I've ever written, asked me to sign them, and then gave me a beautiful piece of fluorite to thank me.

* When I was wandering around the Dealers Room, someone told me that "Gestella" is "the best werewolf story ever written."

* Only ten people attended my reading, but one of them was Cory Doctorow, a Much Bigger Name than I am, who appeared to genuinely love the reading and told me it reminded him of some of Kelly Link's work. She's an Infinitely Bigger Name than I am.

* I didn't expect many people to come to my signing today. It was a group signing, and Carrie Vaughn was signing at the same time; I figured she'd have lines around the block and I'd be twiddling my thumbs, so I brought my knitting. Carrie -- sitting next to me, as it turned out -- indeed had long lines, but mine weren't bad. I signed solidly for the first half hour. After that, it got a bit spottier, but not enough for me to get any knitting done. There were a few people who had multiple copies of my books, and someone who had a copy of my very first story, published in 1985 in Asimov's, and someone who said that he's bought anthologies simply because they contained stories I'd written, and several people who heaped praise on "Gestella." And towards the end of the hour, Mega-Infinitely Bigger Name Than I Am Carrie Vaughn turned to me and said, "Susan, I just want you to know that 'Gestella' blew my mind, and as a writer of werewolf fiction I tell other people to read your story, because I think it's definitive."

Holy crap.

* I've always been deeply moved and honored that Jo Walton, whose work I admire tremendously (and who's also much better known than I am), has said glowing things about my work in print. I was very excited to learn that she'd be at Renovation. I looked forward to meeting her in person. I was flattered when she asked if we could have tea together and hang out for an hour between panels, and more than a little startled when she said that one of the reasons she came to the con was to meet me, "because you don't travel much, and I knew you lived here."

Jo proceeded to give me a bracing pep talk. She reads the blog (hi, Jo!), and, among other things, said briskly, "It's perfectly obvious from your blog that you spiral down into depression and then pull yourself back out, but you need to get to more cons. The external validation's really important." We talked about cons: WorldCon and World Fantasy are often impossible because they conflict with teaching. Lately, the only cons I've attended have been WisCon and Mythcon, and even that's been spotty. I'm going to Mythcon again next year; I've been waffling about WisCon. Jo recommended the Fourth Street Fantasy Convention, which I've heard about but have never gotten to. Inez and I are talking about sharing a room there next year.

After tea with Jo (coffee for me, actually, which may have been unwise that late in the afternoon), I went home to help Gary get ready for dinner, since we were having Inez and Kurt and Kurt's wife Shauna over. I babbled to Gary about all this. Before I'd even told him about Jo's depression comment, he said, "You need to get to more cons. This is doing you more good than all the meds you've ever taken. It's all about connection and community."

Yep.

I know this probably sounds like a lot of insufferable bragging, but I've effectively been in exile from my community for a long time. Part of that's geographical; a lot of it's been self-imposed; and it's been reinforced and deepened by my increasing marginalization within my department. Some people there admire the fact that I write, but as far as I can tell, none of my English Department colleagues read my fiction, or particularly like it if they do (other university friends, especially in the music department, have been loyal fans and a wonderful cheering section). Various of my colleagues clearly think I'm a little strange -- one person I like and admire once called me a "fanatic" to my face -- and between all that and the fact that the job's become more difficult and less rewarding for all of us, leading to a universal nosedive in morale, I haven't felt deeply affirmed at work. I know some of that's my fault, especially because I'm terrible at certain kinds of political games, but blaming myself only makes me feel worse.

Church has filled in a lot of the holes -- faith's really a huge antidepressant -- but it can't do everything.

The recent three-year grief-fest hasn't helped any of this, of course (and that's not my fault, and I think my reactions have been entirely human and understandable).

So I went to WorldCon figuring that I'd see some old friends and that nobody else would know who I was, and that would be okay, because it would be my fault, because I haven't been writing much.

What I discovered instead is that people in my field know my work and admire it. People I've never met know my work and admire it. People I admire, blazingly successful and famous and talented people, know my work and admire it. I've written things that matter to other human beings.

It is very difficult to communicate what this feels like. Like floating in airless space and then finding yourself standing on solid ground in a beautiful forest? Like being a ghost and then regaining a body? (Good heavens: am I empathizing with Sauron and Voldemort?) Those are cheesy metaphors, and unsatisfying besides. Let's just say that I've found my country again, or my planet, and learned that I was always welcome there.

So yes, I'll definitely try to get to more cons. I'm exhausted, and I'll be grateful to get back to a normal schedule when WorldCon's over, but I'm going to be very sad when everyone leaves.

In the meantime, I may buy myself a token of citizenship. Y'know how in some fantasy stories, people think their adventures Elsewhere were just a dream, until they discover that they still have a coin or a key or a crown they were given there? The fluorite rock would work, but I can't keep it with me all the time, so I may indulge my shopping obsession and buy a ring. Laurie Edison makes gorgeous jewelry and sells it at cons. It's pricy, so I've never bought any of it. But today I tried on a series of rings and both Laurie and I went, "Oh, wow," at one particular one with a shiny blue stone that looks like opal but I think is something else I can't remember at the moment.

If that's still available tomorrow, I may spring for it, as a sign of renewed commitment to my SF/F citizenship. If it isn't available, I'll cart the fluorite around, maybe, or get some smaller thing. Either way, I'll be registering for Fourth Street.

This is an exceedingly long post. Thank you for bearing with me!

Decadence

Because there's so much alcoholism in my family (and it's so genetic), I drink very, very little. For years, my only alcohol consumption was a sip of communion wine every Sunday. I never drink when we're out and about here in Reno, since Gary can't see quite well enough to get a driver's license, which means that I'm always the designated driver.

I like the taste of some drinks, especially cordials, but hate feeling drunk. Since I have absolutely no tolerance for alcohol -- a very good thing, if one has a genetic predisposition to alcoholism on top of a depression history -- my limit is something like two teaspoonfuls.

Over two hours.

On a full stomach.

On our Spring Break cruise, though, I didn't have to drive, so a couple of evenings I got an after-dinner drink while we listened to the string quartet. I had an Amaretto, which was yummy, and a few nights later I had a Kahlua, which was even yummier. Since they give you a bit more than two teaspoonfuls, I learned that I had to space these treats out over the entire evening, which was fine. I also learned, after a second Kahlua the evening after the first, that if I drank two nights in a row -- even slowly and on a full stomach -- my sleep would be disrupted. This is a well-known effect of alcohol, of course, but twice I awoke to hypnopompic hallucinations. In one case, I thought I saw Gary, lying face down, floating above me: I screamed, but when I turned I saw him sleeping soundly beside me in bed, and then the hallucination dissolved. The second time it happened, I saw a disembodied head floating above me.

Charming.

When I got home, I did enough research to learn that hallucinations upon falling asleep (hypnogogic) and waking up (hypnopompic) are fairly common and considered normal, although alcohol can exacerbate them. They often involve floating figures. I'll bet this is where stories about succubi come from; maybe vampires, too.

Anyway, these episodes were definitely enough to make me space out my after-dinner cordials! When we got home, I occasionally (as in once a week, max, but usually more like once every two weeks) had a tiny amount of a chocolate dessert wine a friend gave us for Christmas. No more creepy floating figures, so I must have gotten the interval right. I just finished the bottle last week, and Gary said, "You should get some Kahlua."

"Eh," I said, shrugging.

But today we were at the supermarket, and Gary got some wine for himself, and I went to browse the cordials section. "Are you going to get some Kahlua?" he asked.

"I think not," I said, goggling at the price.

"It's a premium liqueur," he said, picking up the smallest bottle, "and this will last you for a year."

The smallest bottle was under fifteen bucks, so I shrugged again, and we got it. I may even have a little tonight.

But if I start dancing on tabletops while wearing lampshades (a maneuver I'd consider highly dangerous even without distilled spirits, given how clumsy I am), anyone who cares about me is authorized to haul me into the Betty Ford Center.

Headless Susan and the Button Scarf of Doom

Here's another one: much longer than the first, as you can see. I knit this from mystery wool. My local art-supply place sells unlabeled yarn in varying quantities, and I got about a bajillion yards of this stuff for $7 (after knitting the scarf, I still have at least a third of the yarn left).

I think the zig-zag pattern's fun. Finding matching buttons was surprisingly hard, since most of the tans I found were grayer than I needed. Also, since it's cheap, scratchy yarn, I didn't want to get really fancy buttons. But these match nicely and weren't expensive at all, even if they're a bit monochrome.

Since it's cheap, scratchy yarn, I'm keeping the scarf, which will also have to be worn with a turtleneck so as not to chafe my neck to bits. But it will be a nice warm thing for winter (modelling it was a bit much this evening; we got into the low nineties here today, and although the desert cools off when the sun goes down, it's still not turtleneck-with-a-wool-scarf weather).

I may very well use this same pattern, in a shorter length and in much nicer yarn, for some Christmas or birthday gifts. It knits up quickly, and my loved ones who appreciate funky stuff would like it, I think.

Bits and Pieces

In no particular order:

* I've been making small but steady daily progress on the new draft.

* We had a lovely dinner tonight with a friend of mine from the hospital, an RN, and her husband. They have comp credits at one of the local casinos and treated us to a splendid meal at a fancy steakhouse there. Yum! It was really fun, and we hope to reciprocate by having them over here for dinner soon.

* On the way home, we stopped at Home Depot so Gary could buy various home-improvement items. While I waited for him, I started wondering if any hardware could be converted to knitting use. And, indeed, it turns out that o-rings used for plumbing repair are perfect stitch markers (although I'm not sure they're much less expensive than the stitch markers sold by knitting suppliers, which are already very reasonable).

* I'm in the process of trimming monthly expenditures, since this is my last month on full salary (next month is paycut plus the furlough that's being applied each of the next two years, plus sabbatical reduction). I reduced my Audible subscription from two credits to one each month; I'd been planning to cancel it entirely, but Gary said I should keep it. Then I started cancelling, or asking how to cancel -- since not all organizations make it easy -- my four small monthly donations to Modest Needs, the Humane Society, Doctors Without Borders and First Book. Modest Needs allows you to cancel a pledge from the website; I sent the others e-mail explaining that I'll reinstate my pledge when I come off sabbatical, and will also make occasional one-time donations during the sabbatical year as I'm able, but that I need to cancel the automatic pledge for the next twelve months. (I'll still be doing my ten percent tithe on discretionary purchases, so that's where one-time donations will come from.) This is prudent and fiscally responsible, but made me feel so wretched that I decided I really need to cancel the Audible subscription entirely too, as long as Audible can assure me that my wish list, and the books I've already purchased, will remain accessible. I've been stocking up on audiobooks in preparation for sabbatical, so it's really a purely symbolic sacrifice.

I'm not a big fan of "I can't have fun if anyone else is unhappy" thinking -- see recent yarn purchases, for instance -- but I decided I just wasn't comfortable buying audiobooks every month if I wasn't also, you know, helping starving cats and buying mosquito netting for field hospitals.

Note: In some quarters it's considered very tacky to talk about money, and especially to admit to charitable donations (that whole "when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your alms may be done in secret" Ash Wednesday thing). However, I've come to the conclusion that our society would be a lot healthier if more people were comfortable discussing finances, and I think an open discussion of how and where and why we give -- or don't -- is part of that. And I certainly talk openly about how much I shop, so this is just balance, yes?

Haul

Here's the haul. Between the fifty percent discount and the gift certificate from my sister, I got all this stuff for just under $150. That includes a lovely book of lace-shawl patterns, fifteen skeins of yarn (including some alpaca), two circular needles (including an ebony pair), and two sets of buttons, one handblown glass and one bone.

My yarn vault is very full and very happy.

The owner of the shop is closing just because she's tired and wants to do other things, but she'll still be active in local knitting groups. And she isn't closing until all her stock's gone, so she'll probably be there for a while yet.

Needles

Today I went to see the new doctor, who's also a medical acupuncturist. (He told me that in fact, the insurance companies are pulling him off primary-care panels and listing him as a specialist, which means that I should list his nurse-practitioner as my primary-care person.) I like him a lot. He took notes and checked my records on a laptop, but made plenty of eye contact. When I told him why I wanted acupuncture -- for sinus and gastric issues, two of the conditions for which the World Health Organization recommends acupuncture -- he promptly asked for the history on both. When he found out that I'm not taking an acid blocker because I'm nervous about osteoporosis, he said, "The risk of not taking the pills is greater than the risk of taking them," and then he told me that not all of them interfere with calcium absorbtion at the same level. He said that Zantac is pretty benign that way, especially if I also take both calcium and Vitamin D -- which I already do -- so I'm back on that as of this evening.

After he took my medical history, he asked me what I do for a living, and then what I do for fun. As he was positioning the needles for the acupuncture, he said, "So, do you feel as if you've been able to do what you've wanted with your life?"

Nobody's ever asked me that broad a question: not psychologists, let alone any kind of internist. I was very impressed. This guy seems to have a firm grasp on both Western and Eastern medicine, is comfortable using both, and also pays attention to the Whole Person. My only quibble is that his voice is so soft that I often can't hear him, but I'll just have to ask him to speak up. (He works out of a medical spa, which has a very cushy waiting room with aromatherapy and soothing music and deep, fluffy chairs: it feels like the lobby of a high-end hotel. That's different from my usual experience, too, as was the fact that he came out to get me himself and conducted the entire visit without a nurse.)

The acupuncture was fine. He's very deft at needle insertion and was very solicitous about whether I was comfortable, putting a pillow under my knees and covering my feet with a blanket because they were a bit chilly. I'm going back for another acupuncture session in three weeks. I don't notice any effects from it yet, but I think it takes a while.

So that went well, I think. I also found the office much more easily on this second visit!

On a less happy note, this evening I facilitated a Literature & Medicine session at the VA and learned from some fellow knitters there that my favorite yarn shop is closing. This is really terrible news, and I hadn't even known about it. Evidently everything's half price, so I'm going to go over there tomorrow morning and load up on whatever's left (I still have part of a gift certificate my sister gave me for my birthday, but I'm sure I'll go over that).

Because Claire Asked

Here's a photo of the new red buttons in my mother's actual button basket, the only one I ever remember her using. I spent many happy hours going through her buttons when I was a kid.

The basket's pretty beaten up, but I can't bear to get rid of it. Ironically, the button closure on the outside has broken off, so I may need to buy a new button for the button box. Oooooh! An excuse to go back to JoAnn's!

Button Heaven!

I'm blogging from a Starbucks on the new mini-machine. It wouldn't connect at work, but my regular laptop doesn't connect at work either. It connected fine here, which bodes well for travel.

I went to my favorite yarn store to look for buttons today, but she didn't have any. "I get my buttons at JoAnn's," she said, and told me how to get there. I think maybe I was there a million years ago looking for yarn and was disappointed in the selection, so I promptly forgot about the place.

Their yarn selection's indeed very limited, but their button selection's fabulous: an entire wall and a half of everything you could think of. After much agonizing -- and a consultation with one of the clerks -- I bought three large, red, asymmetrical buttons for the scarf. I'll post a picture when it's done.

I'll definitely be going back there. I had to restrain myself from buying far more buttons than I need at the moment. One project at a time!

I am going to start a button box at home, though. Fun!

Buttons, Anyone?

The homily went fine; the mom of the baby being baptized even asked for a copy, so that was a nice compliment. I preach next on July 24, on Jesus' parables about the Kingdom of Heaven in Matthew: mustard seeds, pearls of great price, hidden treasure.

Meanwhile, today I decided that the new scarf will need buttons so it can be used as a longish cowl (since it will be too short as a scarf), and that sent me off on an idea about using small bits of yarn to knit skinny necklace-like scarves fastened with buttons -- one loop gives you a necklace, wrap it around a few times and you have something more like a scarf -- which sent me on a button hunt. Lace would work well for this, since it provides lots of natural buttonholes. Of course, it may be a daft idea, but I'll try a few of them and see how they come out.

It turns out there are a lot of different kinds of buttons, and a lot of places to buy them on the internet (well, of course). Looking at all of them quickly made me dizzy, and anyway I don't think trying to match yarn color to monitor images is very safe, so I've decided that I'll only buy buttons in person. I stopped by Franklin's on my way to the second church service, but they didn't have anything very interesting, or anything that worked with the current scarf. Next I'll try the yarn stores in town. Do thrift or antique stores sell buttons? I guess I can call and ask.

This new little side hobby could waste hours of time.

Also, if I don't find anything I like in town -- or maybe even if I do -- I may take a road trip to a button shop near Sacramento (if they have a storefront rather than just being online, which I have to check). It looks like they have an amazing selection.

I have some antler and horn buttons a friend got in Alaska for me, so now I'm trying to figure out what yarn they'll go with. Also, check out this totally cool art-deco button (sorry for the blurry image; my phone's camera doesn't do well with close-ups of little things). I've had this since I was a child; I don't even remember if it came from my mother's button box or from a grandmother, but I loved it as a kid and have kept it all these years. Very occasionally, it pays to be a pack rat. There's only one of it, and it doesn't go with any of my current yarn. I'll have to buy special yarn for it.

Hey! A reason to buy more yarn! Bwah hah hah!

I wonder if my July 24 homily will wind up being about buttons.

Tiny Treats

"There was coffee. Life would go on."

These lines are from William Gibson's brilliant short story "The Winter Market," and pretty much sum up my and Gary's take on mornings. (We use the quotation all the time; it's one of our tag lines.) So imagine our distress this morning when our industrial-strength coffee maker died. We have an emergency-backup French press, so we survived, although we consider the coffee quality inferior. Tonight we went shopping for a new coffee maker, though.

We got a Krups at Bed, Bath & Beyond. It was pretty pricy, but this is an essential home item, so it's worth the investment. Then we went next door to World Market, because Gary was thinking about getting more Adirondack chairs for our deck.

"Honey," I said, "we have enough chairs." In fact, we have chairs stacked in the garage we don't even use regularly. We used them for Dad's memorial service last July; we'll use them again for our Worldcon dinner party this coming August. We need them when we need them, but we just don't entertain that much.

So we didn't get any more chairs. Gary got a $29 side table, though, because he couldn't stand the idea of going into Memorial Day Weekend without any deck furniture to assemble.

Meanwhile, I browsed around the store. I love World Market because it has some of everything, and also brings back happy memories. In 2001, I spent Christmas with my father in Mississippi. He'd had quadruple bypass about a month beforehand, and he really needed me there. It was very much a turning point for the better in our relationship. Before I went down, I asked if he wanted anything from Reno for Christmas, and he said, "A baby elephant." So I went to World Market and got a bunch of elephant stuff: elephant ornaments, an elephant mug, an elephant wall hook, an elephant picture frame, and so forth. That shopping expedition was really fun -- one of my best Christmas memories -- and since then, the elephant items at World Market have always cheered me up.

I needed cheering up today. I'm fed up with the book (although I'm doggedly plowing through it), completely stuck on -- and panicking about -- the homily I have to write for Sunday, being pecked to death by small pieces of paperwork from a blizzard of sources, and basically out of sorts. I worked out on the elliptical for forty minutes before dinner, which helped quite a bit, but I was still cranky.

So I wandered through World Market, smiling at elephant soap dishes and paperweights and wall hangings and mosaics. I didn't buy any elephant things, though. There's just too much stuff in the house (including the elephant gifts I gave Dad that Christmas, and inherited after he died), and anyway, we'd just gotten the expensive coffee maker. I decided I could get a few very small items if they'd get used up, rather than sitting and gathering dust. So I bought two dark chocolate caramels with sea salt (a decadent little treat Gary and I shared in the car on the way home), a small box of fruit-shaped marzipan (because I love marzipan and my mother always gave me some for Christmas), a small tube of jasmine-scented hand lotion for my purse, and a slightly larger bottle of orange-scented body lotion to use after I shower.

Now my hands smell good, and I've eaten a little chocolate, and I have the marzipan stored away as a future treat. So I'm feeling better.

And there will be coffee tomorrow morning. Life will go on.

Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie 7-Inch Computerini

Oh dear. That sounds obscene, doesn't it?

For lo these many months, I've been looking for a seven-inch technogadget -- something small enough to fit in my purse -- that will give me easy access to e-mail and the internet, especially Blogger and Google Docs. I wanted something ultra-portable and ultra-cheap for short trips (like Mythcon) and local coffeeshop jaunts, occasions when hauling my netbook around is just a bit more trouble than it's worth.

The obvious candidate would be a tablet, but I really wanted something with a physical keyboard (and without a pricey phone contract). I'd thought about unlocked versions of the Samsung Galaxy Tab or Dell Streak, combined with a Bluetooth keyboard, but playing with the tablets at local stores hadn't made me sufficiently enthusiastic to justify their price tags.

I love Google's Chrome browser and have eagerly followed news of Chrome-based netbooks, but the first ones being released are even larger than my current netbook, not to mention (as many people have noted) ridiculously expensive for something that's basically a smart terminal.

I really wanted a seven-inch netbook. ASUS used to make them, but doesn't anymore -- the smallest netbook currently available is 10.1", and I own one of those -- and I kept reading snarky articles asking why anyone would want a netbook now that tablets are here, anyway.

Keyboards, that's why. Some of us still type!

Tonight, lo and behold, I discovered on Amazon a pair of used ASUS 7-inch netbooks for $150, and after conferring with Gary, snapped one of them up. As he said, at that price, it makes sense to try the machine out. The customer reviews praise it for internet and e-mail, which is exactly how I plan to use it. Everyone says the keyboard's small, but so are my hands. The machine runs Linux, but I believe I can install Chrome on it (and if not, I'll still be able to get to gmail and Google Docs, which is what matters). If the thing sucks or completely doesn't work, I'll return it, but this may be exactly what I've needed. If it works, I'll have an upstairs desktop, a downstairs/deck netbook, and a purse netbook.

I'd still bring the 10.1 netbook on longer trips, especially if I'm working on resident files (the ASUS doesn't have much storage). But for cloud computing, this could be pretty nifty.

DIY Art Therapy

At the end of my last lesson with Charlene, she said, "Thank you for all your hard work." The statement caught me a little off guard. I've been very, very conscious of how bad my playing is; although I do have some abilities -- as Charlene said, "You have a good ear; if I play a tune for you, you can play it back to me" -- I don't speak the language of music and would never consider myself a musician. I'm somebody who enjoys scratching out very rough tunes on the viola.

But what Charlene said made me think, "Huh. Yeah, I have worked hard at this, haven't I?" And, more to the point, when I've been able to let go of my deeply ingrained perfectionist streak, I've enjoyed it.

The perfectionist thing goes way back. I'll spare you the history; suffice it to say that for many years, I was one of those unhappy people who measured my worth by my external accomplishments, especially grades. This tends, or tended in my case anyway, to turn into a glass-half-empty mindset: I measured myself according to what I hadn't done, and if you think that way, you'll always consider yourself a failure, because there's always someone who's done more.

I've been struggling with this issue lately at work. For one thing, academics are increasingly being evaluated as much by what they haven't done as by what they have, which is why I won't be going up for full professor. I have to keep reminding myself that even if I don't have the "national profile" required for promotion, I have published four books (with more on the way, I hope), and also perform community service I wouldn't have time for were I serving on MLA committees. The non-promotion situation, though, has re-sensitized me to how stressful glass-half-empty thinking is on colleagues and other people around me.

It's a tricky issue. Several of my students this semester have been very upset that I graded them on the results of their work, rather than on their effort. My response, and that of most professors I know, is that I have no way to measure relative effort, and that other arenas of human experience (most jobs, for instance) evaluate on results, too. Learning to come to terms with that is an important part of a college education.

At the same time, though, I always try to tell my students that their grades are not the measure of their personal worth. I know many of them don't believe me; if they did, the grades wouldn't upset them so much in the first place, and at that age, I sure didn't believe anybody who told me the same thing. I'm always heartened by students who maybe didn't get perfect grades, but who say that they enjoyed the class, or learned something, or acquired a new skill. In other words, the students who are looking at what they have, and not at what they don't: glass-half-full folk. They're so much healthier than I was in college.

Another way of defining this is process thinking versus product thinking. Both are important, but in different ways and for different purposes, and if you enjoy a process, you've gained something even if no one else appreciates the product. (One of the problems with academic promotion procedures right now is that the range of acceptable products has tightened considerably.)

It needs to be said that some of this stuff is a function of consumer culture, which encourages to focus on what we don't have so we'll go buy it. As an inveterate shopper, I'm very familiar with that pattern.

So, anyway. Today, as previously advertised, I sat down to start revising the latest novel. I did fine; I'm about ten pages in. But the next two sections, the ones scheduled for tomorrow, will require a lot of changes and some major plot rethinking, and I felt my stomach clenching up about it even today. Gotta get it right gotta get it right gotta get it right.

That mantra serves a purpose, but at this stage it's counter-productive. It's classic glass-half-empty thinking, because I'm looking at what's wrong, what isn't there: at lack, rather than possibility.

I played the viola for a while, since that always gets me to loosen up. Playing the viola means giving myself permission to do something badly, just because it's fun.

Then I decided to go shopping for a Magic Revision Pencil (inveterate shopper!). I like soft, dark pencils, and the number two I used this morning wasn't cutting it. Staples didn't have anything softer. After a few other unproductive stops, I wound up buying a drawing pencil at an art-supply store.

And that reminded me how much I like drawing. As a kid, I had a modest amount of artistic talent and drew and painted up a storm, to the lavish praise of the adults around me. I loved it. But as I got older and fell further into glass-half-empty, I became shyer about the visual stuff. I wasn't good enough. I wasn't skilled enough. I wasn't a Real Artist. This is of course either completely true or utter hogwash, depending on your point of view. I'll never be in MOMA or be paid for my artwork, but I have as much right to draw, paint and doodle as anybody else.

Back in 2006, inspired in part by a course I'd taken on art as spiritual practice, I briefly kept a drawing journal. Every day I'd produce a little doodle. Some are quite pretty; some are hideous; all of them were absorbing and fun. But after a while, I became too self-conscious about that project, too, and put the sketchbook away.

Today I took it out again. I sharpened up my colored pencils and doodled for an hour or so. The product will never be in MOMA, but the process made me very happy. As kids know, and as adults too often forget, coloring's a blast! (I can't remember who said, "All five year olds know they can draw. All fifteen year olds know they can't," but it's spot on.)

I hope to do one of these a day. I think the drawing journal -- along with the viola and knitting -- will help me stay relaxed on the writing front. And anything that creates joy should be maximized.

Thanks, Mom

Since Monday was the anniversary of Mom's death and Saturday is the anniversary of her funeral, I've been pretty weepy this week. I've certainly been thinking about her a lot.

Mom loved to help me (and later, Gary and me) buy major household items, or just buy them for us. Over the years, she was the generous source of at least two beds, an air conditioner, at least one refrigerator, a beautiful set of dining room chairs, a rocking chair, a bench for our hallway, and countless smaller things: knick-knacks and decorations, including a number of gorgeous needlepoint pieces she made herself. She'd grown up during the Depression, although her family was much better off than most. When I was a child, she struggled financially as a divorced woman raising two daughters (essentially without help from my father, whose alcoholism, for many years, kept him from being a good provider either for himself or anyone else). I never knew a time when she wasn't acutely aware of money, but she also loved spending it on nice things for herself and for us. Most parents love helping out their kids, but I think my parents, because of their family and personal histories, especially treasured that role. (My father never stopped drinking entirely, but he became quite a bit more stable -- and infinitely more financially responsible -- in the last twenty years of his life, and he was thrilled when Gary and I moved into our house. He flew out to help us, drove the moving van, bought us a fancy drill, and worked twelve hours a day fixing things around the new place.)

We didn't inherit a gigantic amount of money from my mother, but it's been enough to pay for a new roof and the new deck. Our tax refund this year -- which came indirectly from her, since we deliberately over-withheld on the inheritance -- paid for the new elliptical.

Today we got the final check from the estate, our share of the amount the attorney had been holding back in case any unexpected bills came in. "Hey, this will pay for two-thirds of the new awning," Gary said.

"Mom's still helping out," I told him. And of course I got weepy again, and even weepier when I called my sister to tell her we'd gotten the check.

My father loved sitting on our old deck, although it was so rickety that I cringed whenever I saw him inching across it. He would have adored the new one. So would Mom, and I know she'd be delighted that she helped us buy the awning for it.

Home Improvements

Well, I'm still a little headachy and a little nauseous, but -- after a very slow and discombobulated day -- I managed to swim for half an hour this evening. Since I hadn't exercised since Saturday (skipping my Sunday workout may have been one of the causes of the Tuesday migraine), I feel as if I'm now getting back on track.

And just in time, since our new elliptical arrives tomorrow! Yay! I'm so looking forward to being able to work out at home without having to gather all my gym gear (although I'll still use the pool at the gym). Gary's looking forward to being able to work out at home when bad weather prevents hiking. We're both curious about how the cats will respond to the new intruder; I foresee initial alarm, especially when the thing's moving, but I'm sure they'll adjust.

On Monday, the guy who built our deck is coming over to fix a loose post. We're going to find out how much he'd charge to do the annual pressure washing and resealing.

Our shade canopy collapsed in a rainstorm last autumn and was wrecked beyond repair, so we're going to invest in a large custom retractable awning (with a manual crank, not one of the motorized ones, which brings the price down at least a little bit). This is a large chunk of change, but it's also a big improvement to our living space. We spend a lot of time out on the deck in warm weather -- I effectively move my office out there for at least part of the day, and we like to entertain there too -- and adequate shade's essential. (This is the driest, sunniest state in the country, and we're also at altitude, so UV protection is a real issue.)

The awning plus the elliptical add up to a lot of money when I'm about to a) have my pay cut and b) go onto two-thirds of the lower salary because of the sabbatical. But since I'm staying home during the sabbatical, home needs to be as pleasant and workable as we can make it, and I think these two items will really help.

In Which We Become Ugly Americans

Our second day in PV has been a bit of a bust. We slept late, rolled off the boat around ten, and ambled down to the docks to see if we could find a short whale-watching trip. The only one we found was from one to five, though, and the boat's leaving at 3:30, so that didn't work. The tour operator offered us a private trip for $200. I know buyers are expected to bargain in Mexico, but I just wasn't up to it, so we told him we weren't interested.

Walking back to the cruise pier, we saw two Mexican soldiers with machine guns and grenades casually guarding the tourist docks. Mind you, this is inside the cruise complex, which is surrounded by fencing topped with barbed wire and guarded by private security guards who check cruise ID at the gates. (Getting off the boat, one of the HAL crew had told me, "Be careful with your belongings!") After seeing the machine guns, Gary decided that he wasn't up to exploring. I'd wanted to amble around old PV when I thought I could get there on foot, but having to take a cab -- and not being sure how reliably I could get one back -- made me chicken out, too. If I had more energy today, and if we'd had more time, I'd have gone for it anyhow, but I'm exhausted. I've been having a lot of nightmares on this trip (the nuclear news from Japan certainly hasn't helped), and last night's was a long, complicated dream about losing my job, so I didn't wake up feeling very refreshed.

So what did we do? We crossed the street and, heaven help us, went to the mall, where I bought a Nike swimsuit I've wanted and hadn't been able to find in the States. Then we went to the Starbucks and had iced coffee. I used my tiny bit of Spanish only to apologize for the fact that I speak only a tiny bit of Spanish. The Nike saleswoman and I communicated largely with hand gestures.

On our way back to the ship, it occurred to me that one isn't supposed to drink iced beverages in Mexico. I just hadn't been thinking: we were in an American-style mall, buying from an American chain, surrounded by Americans on their laptops, but that doesn't change the fact that the fauna's different down here. I'd committed the very definition of a stupid tourist mistake. Whoops. Back on board, I talked to a member of the crew, who rolled her eyes and told me I'd probably be fine, but that if I got sick I should call the medical department.

So far we're okay, but the crew member said it takes twenty-four hours. In the meantime, we ate lunch. Gary's pacing the deck; I'm blogging. I wanted to take a nap, but our stateroom's right above the showroom, where there's a rehearsal for some extravaganza with thunderously loud bass, so that wasn't going to happen.

The ship's internet cafe is ten decks up. From up here, the view's lovely, and I just saw two pelicans fly by. That's the highlight of the day so far.

I'm so glad we have an excursion booked for Cabo tomorrow. I just hope we're healthy for it.

Vacation's Coming!

This time next week, our cruise ship will be on its way to Mexico. I can't wait! We now both own snorkels and wetsuits; corrective masks are on their way and should arrive Wednesday. Today I found the fitover sunglasses I'd misplaced -- they were wedged between the gearshift and the driver's seat in the car -- so we're just about all set.

I've ordered an MP3 of my mother's message: it wasn't very expensive, and I prefer that to fooling with cables. (Thanks again, Danielle! So good to know that service is out there.)

As of today, I've volunteered over 950 hours at the hospital (950.5, to be precise). We had a code, but the patient came back quickly, and I pray he'll do okay in the ICU. Otherwise, my most memorable visit of the day was with a sneering atheist -- a bit like my father, but with much less pleasant manners -- who lectured me for several minutes about how all religions are based on guilt, about how religion is just an addiction, and about how religious people just want to kill anyone who doesn't share their views.

I commented that if religion's an addiction, it's healthier than heroin or meth. He ignored that. When he got to the homicidal believer part, I said, "Y'know, I'm religious, and I'm not trying to kill you, am I? I've never tried to kill anybody. I've never even wanted to kill anybody."

He ignored that, too. It's a source of continual amazement to me that people who a) don't share my faith, and b) are actively hostile to my faith, nonetheless a) believe that they know more about what I believe than I do and b) blithely disregard whatever contrary evidence I'm providing by standing in front of them.

"All religious people only want to kill nonbelievers!" Yes, that's why the hospital chaplain just asked if there's anything she can do to make you more comfortable.

I guess it just goes to show that non-religious folk can be every bit as closed-minded as the believers they're berating. Although, really, when I started volunteering six years ago, I expected much more of this kind of thing (as my father's daughter, I learned to get ready for long, detailed arguments whenever the word "God" popped up). In all that time, only a handful of patients have been nasty, which is really pretty remarkable, when you consider that anybody in the ER is having a very bad day. What amazes me is how polite almost everybody is, regardless of spiritual background. Still, this guy could have used some courtesy coaching from one of our well-mannered Satanists.

Good Day

This morning I met with my rector; we had a very pleasant chat, and he invited me to preach on Maundy Thursday and on May 29 (Memorial Day Weekend). I'm really looking forward to writing homilies again, and I'm honored to be preaching during Holy Week.

I ate my brown-bag lunch at church, raced to the gym and swam for thirty minutes, and then drove to the family shelter to teach my poetry class. I absolutely loved it. You can read about it on the UNR Poetry Project blog. The eight weeks of classes will culminate with a gallery show, probably at the university, and one of today's students has already given permission for her poem to be displayed (which makes me very happy, because it's a gorgeous piece of work).

It was incredibly moving to hear people in such tough circumstances express so much love for their families. As a side note, I was also very impressed with the physical plant; I'd been to the medical clinic downstairs to donate my father's meds after he died, but I'd never been inside the family shelter. It's clean and spacious, and seems very comfortable. Each family has its own room, and I loved looking at the kids' artwork posted on the doors.

When I got home, Gary and I decided to dash out to a store in Sparks that sells sports optics; we were hoping to get prescription snorkel masks. The store sells them, but they cost about $200 each, which is way too much money for an activity we indulge in once a year if we're lucky. So we're going to look for less expensive options. The cruise line supplies equipment, but we don't know if they'll have optical masks.

The store was fairly close to the fancy mall with the big sports store where I bought my wetsuit, so while we were in the neighborhood, we decided to go look at ellipticals. And, mirabile dictu, we found one! We hope to very soon be the proud owners of a Horizon Ex-59, which -- at its sale price of $599 -- was the second-least-expensive machine in the store. It seems really solid and smooth, though, and the online reviews we've seen have been good. We could have ordered a slightly older model, the Ex-57, from Amazon: less money, no tax. But after reading about people spending two or three hours assembling their machines, and winding up covered in grease, we've decided to spring for the tax, since if we buy from the store we'll get free delivery and installation, and they'll handle any necessary repairs. Right now the store only has the floor model in stock, but the sales guy is going to call me tomorrow about when they expect more in.

Of course, this is an even larger investment than the masks (and yes, I was conscious of the irony of embarking on this project right after a visit with homeless families), but we'll use it a lot more often. I hope to use it for at least a little while most mornings; I'll be able to work out in my PJs, which means I can give myself a serotonin boost on those mornings when crawling into clothing to crawl into the car to crawl to the gym is just too much effort. Gary dislikes most gym equipment but was very impressed with this, and he can use it when weather keeps him from hiking. So, yeah: big outlay, but I think the price is reasonable for what we'll be getting, and I think it will help with my health goals. My ultimate goal is to work up to using the elliptical half an hour in the morning and then swimming half an hour in the afternoon. That way, I'll get both weight-bearing exercise and the swimming I love, and I'll be able to rest between them. This may be too ambitious, of course, but if I could manage that even a few times a week, I'd be happy.

It was dark when we left the mall. I don't know Sparks very well, and I got lost. We wound up on a long highway without traffic lights. I couldn't see familiar city lights. I couldn't even tell which way we were driving. Finally I pulled up to a supermarket and told a lady there that we were lost. She laughed -- she's gotten lost there too, it turns out -- and offered to lead us back to town.

Talk about angels in disguise. I never would have found my way on my own; we weren't even close to my best foggy guess of our location. Thank you, lady in the silver Cadillac!

After that adventure, we'd have gotten home later than Gary likes to start cooking, so we went out for pizza, to the place that has gluten-free crust and soy cheese. It was very yummy. I'm very grateful to be able to eat pizza again.

Snowier

It's been snowing off and on all day (with chain controls on all mountain roads). We're expecting another two to four inches overnight. One of the ski areas got four feet in twenty-four hours. This is good news for skiers, of course, and also for the snowpack, which had been running a bit low, and which supplies our water during the summer.

This morning I took Gary to the eye doctor for a routine exam, but other than than, I've stayed in: I canceled my fiddle lesson because of weather and didn't even go to the gym, which I probably should have done for my back. Instead, I finished these socks, which I've been working on forever: they aren't things of beauty, but they were my first attempt at calf-shaping (although it turned out I didn't have quite enough yarn for true kneesocks). I'm wearing them now and they're comfy, which is all I ask of socks.

I started another pair with some lovely cashmere-blend sock yarn I bought in Alaska. I've already made socks for my sister with this yarn, and she loves them, so I look forward to wearing mine.

I read a little, wrote a little, graded a little. Gary ordered a wetsuit online. Gary and I used some of our we're-not-in-San-Francisco savings to splurge on two more shore excursions: a snorkel trip in Cabo and a boat-ride-to-Stone-Island in Mazatlan. These are probably overpriced, but we feel safer booking through the ship, especially in Mazatlan; I'm hoping that Stone Island is well away from drug-related violence, although Holland America and several other cruises simply stopped visiting the port for a few weeks when there were problems. Since HAL's put it back on the itinerary, I hope things are safer now.

In very sad news here, the body recovered yesterday has indeed been identified as that of the missing hiker. No cause of death has been made public, although the police say they don't suspect foul play. The woman who died was only fifty-seven.

I don't plan to go to the hospital tomorrow, especially with all the snow. We're not in SF, but I'm taking this as a stay-cation anyway. Of course, if I wake up and feel some prodigious burst of energy, I might change my mind, but how likely is that? And it's not like I don't have enough to do here.

Good Call

As friends have been commenting all day, we clearly made the right decision: it's been chains-only in the mountains since this morning, and even down here, the snow's so heavy that UNR canceled evening classes.

Note to Claire: Yes, you read that right. The accumulated snowfall in the mountains from today through Saturday is projected at twenty-nine to fifty-one inches. This ain't Central Park. Gary and I live at 5,000 feet, a bit higher than downtown Reno (elevation 4,500); Donner Pass, thirty-five miles away, lies at 7,085. (You'll recall from your history lessons that the Donner Party got stuck in lots and lots of snow, right?) This is ski country; also avalanche country; also if you get caught outdoors you could die country, which is why it's major search and rescue country. Even our little local mountain, Peavine, right across the street, can be deadly, which is why I insist that Gary bring his cellphone when he hikes there (which he does for two or three hours every other day, weather permitting), even though he loathes the thing. Neither of us has ever been caught in a storm on Peavine -- although other people have, and have died -- but I almost honest-to-god got bitten by a rattlesnake once. It was coiled and very well hidden in the middle of a trail, and I almost stepped on it, and it struck but missed. I've seen rattlesnakes lower down, too, a few blocks from here on walking trails, albeit not for several years. Granted, they're a warm-weather hazard; one needn't worry about snow and snakes at the same time!

So I'm glad we gave the mountains a miss, but I did drive around in the snow down here today. The new winter tires worked very nicely. In the late afternoon, Gary and I decided to be adventurous and check out a large mall in neighboring Sparks; at a sporting-goods store there, I found this funky wetsuit -- which fit me! -- on sale for $40. Sweet! The water in Mexico will probably be colder than Hawai'i (and Gary finds even those tropical waters too chilly), so I'd wanted to get a wetsuit for our snorkeling excursion, but I didn't expect to find one so quickly. I could do without the dorky logo on the front, and I'm pretty sure it's a guy's suit rather than a woman's, but it fits and the price was right, so I can't complain. Gary had less luck; they didn't have anything in his size that was reasonably priced, but it turns out there are a couple of dive shops in Reno, so we'll check those out. We both love snorkeling and plan to do as much of it as we can, so the investment makes sense.

Speaking of snorkeling, the sporting-goods store sports several huge fishtanks in the form of arched gates, so when you walk under them, you look up to see fish swimming over your head. Surreal photo, eh? I think those guys are catfish. They have whiskers, anyway.

Driving home from the mall was slightly scary; visibility was very poor, and even with the winter tires (going thirty-five miles an hour), I fishtailed a couple of times. But we're here, safe and sound and warm. Time for some nice hot tea!

Addenda:Turns out that I-80 was actually closed for part of today; westbound reopened at 7 p.m., but eastbound's still closed.

Also, tragically, when I looked at that SAR site, I realized that they did a search today -- and recovered a body -- only about six miles from here, in a residential area with lots of hiking trails. (My friend Sharon lives nearby.) A hiker had been missing since Wednesday. The paper notes that police haven't yet confirmed the identity of the body, but it sounds like everyone thinks it's the missing hiker. The body was only recovered a few hours ago, so the authorities haven't determined cause of death yet, either.

Scary, scary stuff. My heart goes out to her family and friends.