Poem Draft: Flamenco Sketches, Part 6

6.
This winter has been good for the grave diggers.
Nostalgia begins from cinema-made memories.
When we are old, we will have the certainty of our age
and the absence of clarity
that will lend it all a divine finality.
Dig a hole and fill the hole.
Be a hole and see a hole.
Spring peeps sing on frozen branches.
Ice storms blow in from the West:
Kansas is buried. Iowa is bogged down.
Violence is percolating in the wealthy cul du sacs of Colorado Springs.
Messiahs wander the high plains of Utah
searching for heaven and easy women,
praying for spread eagle legs of fire and of smoke.
Here in the valley, we wait for Spring.
The city is gray and the lights burn bright
as the mountains in the east are leveled
one foot at a time in the name of neon gods
whose names we never bothered to learn.

Location:Cincinnati, OH

Losantiville Lines: A Baboon Turns 40 (Like A Pope Shits In The Woods)

They see him out dressed in my clothes, patently unclear
whether it's New York or New Year. - Nick Lowe

The road stretched, cracks and crumbles.
It all falls apart and underneath,
exposes fresh earth made
for fresh feet to traverse
and for new eyes to spy
golden valleys and endless skyways. - Cincinnati Day Book




I turn 40 tomorrow. And while it's considered insignificant by some to even pay attention to birthdays after 21 -- 25 if you're one of the lucky ones whose car insurance payment goes down -- I have to admit I'm pretty excited at the prospect.

I realize that this, too, sounds odd. I am, at this moment, supposed to be chasing age inappropriate girls, starting regular regiments of Rogaine and Viagra, buying a gym membership and a tiny red sports car that will reflect the youth in my heart that is not reflected in either my hairline or my waistline.

Men, it has been told to me... generally by women who obsess over their looks or who feel pressured to do so... age gracefully.

I am not particularly sure that is what I am doing, especially since the adjective "graceful" has NEVER been applied to me or anything I do. If anything I have learned and adapted to well to my lack of grace (physical and otherwise) that I am hopefully transcending the mere uncoordinated and entering a realm of something like Art.

Or not. Probably not. But it is good to have a goal.

But probably because of the nature of birthdays... like all arbitrarily important annual markings of the passage of time... I find myself thinking about this time last year, and of the days in between.

I certainly feel like I'm in a better place -- mentally and spiritually, anyway. I chose to stay put here in Porkopolis for the winter in order to spend time with my girlfriend and to save money back for a road stake. On a daily basis I mentally unpack and repack my blue rucksack; my last jaunt taught me that I needed some things I didn't have and that I carried a few things I didn't need. I'm working on lightening the load to make it easier to live on the road... the leaner, meaner rucksack... which I tell myself isn't the same as a little red sports car. Occasionally someone will still ask WHY I feel the pull to go, and I usually shrug and smile and say something cryptic or nonsensical. I'm grateful that Amanda isn't among them. Not that she doesn't have concerns about my need to go Out and About -- but she tries to embrace me as I am.

Or, she is simply lulling me into a state of dizzying bliss before she puts some domestication plan into action.

You will excuse me if I accept the former and reject the latter.

Sometimes in the process of growing into a new relationship, I come across echoes of the old. Sometimes when I am restless ... which happens often... I think about the ways I have tried to soothe my restlessness... AKA, my itchy foot. I have tried drowning it in booze. I have tried burying it in bitterness and in uncommunicative silence. All I can do is stay mindful of these things in the same way I am mindful of my anger and my ability to commit violence.

And sometimes, other nerves are exposed, other pains laid open. Familial drama, pecking order and placement, and the shadows of the fathers that all sons live under. All families have drama, and all families have drama queens. Mine is no different. I have extended relatives who fight over bloodlines, over ashes, and over ownership of the dead. I have had to remind myself over the past few days that the only things I have control over are those things I do or don't do. One of the casualties of all this ego driven bullshit-- which is exactly what it is -- is that while I have a deep desire to understand my father's family, to find some echo and connection with it, I will probably never find it. When parts of The Long Memory are lost, everyone suffers, whether they know it or not.

But all I can control is what I do, or what I don't do.

This, more than anything, probably explains why I will end up going back Out on the road. The Long Memory demands it, and the hole to fill is deeper than I can fill in a lifetime. And while it may sound strange, I find a certain comfort in knowing that.

Location:Cincinnati, OH

Losantiville Lines: Baboon Among The Savages; Code of the Road

The code of the road is to share;
we only have ourselves out there. - The Rev. Peyton's Big Damn Band

The last time I battled the flu was the last time I lived in Losantiville. That time included a trip to Urgent Care for X-Rays and some somber dancing around the results by the staff who insisted I go directly to Good Samaritan Hospital. The nurses told me not to worry, that they had called ahead, the hospital was expecting me. That led to more tests and more worried faces, and the news that I would have to be admitted overnight because someone from Oncology needed to look at the X-Rays; naturally, none of them worked on the weekend. There was a growth in my right lung about the size of of my forefinger, and they weren't sure, but it might.... might, they said... be cancerous.

It turned out to be a viral form of the flu that had exacerbated because, at the time, my then-wife and I didn't have the health insurance for me to go to the doctor when symptoms first emerged.

For years after, she would bring up during various arguments that I never went back for my check-up.

It should be noted, however, that while I have had bouts of the common cold now and again, I never contracted the flu again.... in spite of not getting a flu shot... until now.

I can only conclude that Cincinnati hates me.

This flu, AKA "something bad going around" kept me in bed and not at my teaching gig at NKU this past Monday. It also kept me away from writing, since I was feverish and unable to focus on anything resembling a printed word. And thanks to the lingering malaise that is this damnable flu, I was forced to cancel a trip down river this past weekend in order to try try try to kick it out of my system once and for all.

But it appears that the worst of it has passed, thank Gawd.

The fever cropped up again Thursday afternoon, and broke overnight, so I was able to go to NKU. I barely felt up to the task, but I didn't want to NOT go in again. Catching up for one day missed is difficult enough. You get behind 2 classes, it's starts to become a scheduling nightmare. Too much tug on the end, something else gets shorted when you try give the same time to the stuff you missed for being sick.

Luckily, Friday was a workshop day. Rather than set out basic rules, I gave a general explanation of the difference between a workshop and a peer editing session. Then I sat in the groups and modeled the behavior. Or at least, I tried too. Getting some of them to get over that hump of insecure silence can be a challenge. In the past I've used author cover letters. This time around I'm telling them what to focus on. This far the amount of work this draws from the students in workshop is about the same as I remember in the past. Some students engage; others don't. There were more students participating than in the first round, simply because they're more comfortable.

But I haven't managed to turn myself into paint on the wall yet... i.e, my presence in the groups is still necessary. I have high hopes though. I've always maintained that a good teacher teaches in order to make himself irrelevant. Students decide to take a hold of and direct their own education -- the floating heads call that agency -- and upon learning what they can from the teacher, move on to other more suitable teachers.

Anyhow, that's the way it's supposed to work.

But this generation of college students -- those who fall within the spectrum of those who are what used to be called "traditional students"-- are all products of Bush II's failed NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND educational reform.

The results of it's replacement, RACE TO THE TOP, have yet to be seen, but I am skeptical of any positive impact because nothing has fundamentally changed in how teachers -- particularly K-12 teachers -- are required to teach.

On Friday, I noticed one of my students playing on his phone during workshop. I expect a certain amount of that -- most all of them have smart phones and have used them to look up things related to class -- but when I asked what he was doing, he said he was just "catching up on some news," like he hadn't a care in the world. His group is a quiet one and no one has really taken a leadership role. (That's not always necessary; I much prefer when everyone takes a part of the leadership role.) I asked the student to stop and use the time for course work instead. He balked at it.

I talked to him after class, and he balked again. He pointed out that he paid $4,000 to attend NKU -- saying, I can only imagine, that it is his time to waste. (I seriously doubt it's his money... he has the air of yet another Entitled Boy, that perennial cultural disease.)

Then I told him it was rude. That seemed to throw him; apparently of all the things he's been called out for, rudeness has not been one of them.

I have to admit I'm surprised.

But etiquette, like cursive script, isn't assigned much value anymore.

The only difference is that etiquette is one of the cornerstones of civilization, and script writing is a product of that civilization.

And while I tend to agree with Ambrose Bierce that civilization, on the whole, does very little to civilize mankind, it does make things go smoother when you say "Please" and "Thank You" and try to see how your actions, however innocuous they may be, impact those around you.

A few years ago, I might have handled it differently. I might have said nothing, or treated like a class discussion without naming names. But I am less inclined to worry about the feelings of a spoiled kid with as chip on his shoulder than I am about how his sense of entitlement is going to affect those around him. And before you think I'm one of of those who will rant about "these damn kids today," be aware that I am aware I used to be one of those damn kids that someone else bitched about. This one student's sense of entitlement is nothing new, even if my response is different.

Location:Cincinnati, OH