Saturday Scraps: Ice Cream and More

Saturday seems to be my day of collecting scraps that may or may not make a larger cloth.  Let me do that here:

--I have been in Williamsburg helping my parents recover from my mom's hospitalization.  For the past two days, I've taken them to doctor's appointments, and we've worn masks.  I've been thinking about those Covid years, especially as the news has come about HHS and the decision by RFK Jr. to discontinue funding MRNA vaccine research.  This current administration breaks my heart in many ways, but all the science progress which will be lost is one of the more significant heartbreaks. 

--Yes, I know that I'm speaking from a place of privilege, that if I had loved ones with immigration issues, the heartbreak would be a different one.  So many heartbreaks, significant and small, across so many parts of modern life in the U.S., in just 6 months.  

--But let me also capture happier moments, like the time earlier this week before my trip, when a colleague said she thought it would be fun to be retreat leaders together.  That may be the best compliment of the summer.

--This has been a sober summer, in terms of drinking.  It's the longest stretch of consecutive alcohol-free days I've had since . . . well, I'm not sure.  Probably 2005 or so.  That in itself is sobering.  I last had a glass of wine on June 15, so I'm finishing my 8th week with no alcohol.  I do worry that I've substituted an evening bowl of ice cream for wine, but that's a healthier switch.

--Soon it will be time to switch my full-fat ice cream for something with less fat and calories, if such a creation exists.

--I created this Facebook post yesterday:  "Later today, I will dish up ice cream. My mom will choose raspberry sorbet. I will sing, "She'll have some raspberry sorbet" to the tune of Prince's "Raspberry Beret," and I'll be the only one who gets the pop culture reference, but that will be O.K. because my mom is still here to eat raspberry sorbet, and so is my dad, and it's summer, and we have a wide variety of ice cream to choose from, each one deserving of its own song." It seems to have a bit of poetry--could it become a poem?

The Poetry of the Playlist, for Reviewers and for Students

I have spent a delightful morning pondering Bruce Springsteen--we are almost to the 50th (gasp!) anniversary of the release of the Born to Run album.  Born in the U.S.A. was my Springsteen entry point in the late summer of 1984, and then I got Born to Run later that autumn, in November.  I liked it alright, but I don't think that any other Springsteen album has captured my heart and imagination like Born in the U.S.A.

On the NPR program Fresh Air, I listened to this interview with Peter Ames Carlin, which explored the making of Born to Run--a fascinating glimpse of the creative process.  Before I listened to that interview, I read Peter McWhorter's piece in The Washington Post (hopefully a gift essay to read throughout the ages) about the Springsteen playlist that he listened to seven times--that's all of Born to Run, plus eleven songs:  “Rosalita,” “Prove It All Night,” “Brilliant Disguise,” “The River,” “Spirit in the Night,” “The Promised Land,” “Backstreets,” “Badlands,” “Darkness on the Edge of Town,” “The Rising,” and “New York City Serenade.”

By listening to the playlist seven times, he gained a new appreciation for Springsteen, particularly the poetry of Springsteen.  He has some interesting insights about poetry and the 21st century person:  "My Bruce immersion teaches me that the reason poetry on the page is such a rarefied taste in America today isn’t that Americans don’t have a taste for verse. It’s because there are pop music artists whose lyrics scratch that itch, just as Edna St. Vincent Millay and Robert Lowell once did. Taylor Swift’s music fits into the same category for me, as well as for many people over 40 I have spoken to about her work. I hear her songs as poetry; the music’s job is just to help get it across. And that’s what I hear when I listen to Springsteen: I hear poetry, and I hear Americans’ love of it."

There's also an interesting discussion about why and how the music of Billy Joel is different than that of Bruce Springsteen, and it boils down to the music that shaped them, folk music for Springsteen and Broadway for Joel.

I got some interesting ideas for teaching as I was listening, so let me capture them here:

--During a poetry unit, have students do something similar for the pop culture of their choice.  What scratches the poetry itch in ways that traditional poetry might not?  It could be music or theatre or a movie or a social influencer.

--Have students create a playlist or a watchlist of their favorite artist or artists and an essay about what is revealed by listening/watching across the list.

--Have students imagine the works that are important to them now, and how we'll think about them 50 years from now.  They could write about how the work has shaped them now and then imagine themselves 50 years from now.  Will the work speak to them differently?

Time Wrinkles: Octavia Butler Podcasts and Apocalyptic Texts

I spent much of yesterday the way I have spent Wednesdays for the past two months:  sitting in an Education day, except that instead of sitting around a conference table, I was at my parents' desk, being connected remotely to the interns and supervisor around the conference table.  Today, instead of driving to Spartanburg for meetings and faculty development, I will sit at the dining room table, finishing my sermon for Sunday, which someone else will deliver, and then working on syllabi.

I will also take my dad to his doctor's appointment and remind my mom and dad that it's time to eat the meals that I will provide/prepare/serve.  Tonight after dinner, we will probably watch the national news on PBS and MSNBC.

Last night we watched the news on those two shows, and I continue to be astounded at how the Jeffrey Epstein story dominates still.  It's not that way when I listen to NPR.  I see a story here and there in The Washington Post and The New York Times, but the Epstein story of the day is just one story among many.  I predict that future generations, should humanity survive, will also be astounded at how much time and mental energy this Epstein story, whatever it turns out to be, took over.

Is something being covered up?  Yes, probably, judging by the frantic efforts to keep from releasing whatever isn't being published.  Does it involve high-up government people?  Yes, probably, judging by the frantic efforts to keep from releasing whatever isn't being published.  Will it be important in 10 years?  One hundred years?  What aren't we seeing because we are consumed by this story?

After the endless blathering on TV news networks, my dad said, "I don't really understand that story."  Once I might have tried to explain it.  Last night, I said, "No one does."

Watching MSNBC exhausted at me--all of these people on a panel of 4 who agreed with each other, discussing at high volume with pointy fingers.  

This morning, I'm listening to old podcasts of Toshi Reagon and adrienne maree brown discussing Octavia Butler's Parable of the Sower.  Yesterday, I read this blog post of mine, which references this episode of the podcast, about to-go bags, which made time wrinkle a bit for me.  The podcast was recorded in June of 2020, I first heard it in February of 2021, and now it is 2025, and while much has changed, much has reverted in this time of a second Trump administration.

I listened to that podcast when I was returning to writing my apocalyptic novel, a novel that is unfinished.  I thought about other apocalyptic novels that I've thought of writing, the writing plans I thought of at the beginning of June, and now, here it is August--another time wrinkle.

I am also thinking of my new year's goal of 1 revised poem a week, a goal which seems to be slipping away, although there is still time.  But even if I don't get to that goal, having it has returned me to writing poems as the months have gone on.  I will keep it as a goal for 2026--and the remaining months of 2025.

Travel in Dark and Light Shades

If you came to this blog hoping for a post that commemorates the first dropping of an atomic bomb on a city, head over to this older blog post.  I am in that mind space where I feel I have fallen out of time:  is it Saturday?  If not, why am I here and not somewhere else, getting ready for work?  Is it really August?  I went outside to take a mid-morning walk yesterday and went back to get a sweater.

I am in Williamsburg this morning.  I worked a full day at the hospital yesterday, then got in the car and drove 6 hours to Williamsburg.  I could have made the whole trip and been home by the time the day settled into full darkness, but I was stopped by a drawbridge.  

I had a lovely view of sunset colors, but it made the last half hour of the trip rather harrowing:  winding country roads, very dark, headlights behind me, oncoming traffic occasionally.  

The fact that I was in my 14th hour of wearing my contact lenses exacerbated my night vision issues.  Still, I wonder about my car's headlights.  My car did pass the safety inspection on Monday, but I need to see if my headlights really are O.K.

A clever blogger would tie these vision issues and illumination issues and Hiroshima anniversary into a poetic post, but I am not that blogger this morning.

Instead my brain is whirling, trying to remember what day it is so that I remember to log on for the today's Education training day in the life I left behind.  I am making a grocery list and kicking myself for not thinking about bringing some pantry staples like barley and lentils--but congratulating myself for remembering to bring a variety of tea and a pitcher to make a gallon of iced tea.

Let me remember to savor this time, even though I am here for a non-social visit, by which I mean, we'll be mostly housebound.  If there's one lesson to come out of Hiroshima and a thousand billion other historical events, it's that life can change in an instant, and we often look back with yearning to the before times 

August Travel in a Different Key

Today I will go to my last regular day of CPE, and actually, it's a little less regular than usual.  I'm going in early so that I can leave early to drive to Williamsburg, so that I can spend the rest of the week helping my parents.  

My mom was in the hospital last week, and my sister was there to help them through that.  Now I will arrive so that she can have a break.  We are doing solo caretaking because we hope that it will be less of a schedule disruption than having more people around--so one of us at a time, and spouses stay home to hold down the fort.

I need to leave Monday to be back to start teaching in-person classes on Tuesday (a week from today!) at Spartanburg Methodist College.  My sister might return to my parents on Monday, if they're not ready to resume life without help.

You might say, "Wait--don't your parents live in a continuing care community kind of place?"

Yes, yes they do.  But they're in an independent living part of the housing, which means they need to be independent.  In a week when neither one can drive, they need help.  We could hire help, of course.  But right now, my sister and I have job flexibility, so we can be there to do it.

Yesterday I spent time writing e-mails to explain my situation.  Even though classes don't start until Tuesday (a week from today!), full-time faculty duties start on Thursday and go through Monday:  faculty development, various meetings, and Convocation.

Happily I have been working in a full-time capacity for a year, so I've accumulated plenty of sick leave.  My dean and department head were wonderfully supportive when I wrote to tell them of my predicament and plan.  Similarly, my CPE supervisor is making it possible for me to do tomorrow's education day from my parents' study.

I have packed the car with all kinds of supplies:  poems to work on, books to read, my sewing basket, art supplies, and of course, this computer will come with me.  It will be a working time away on many levels.  I have syllabi to complete for both my in-person and online fall classes.  I have the final CPE report to write.  I have parents to care for.

But I expect that there will be some periods of down time, and I'm hoping to get a bit of recharging time in.  This summer has exhausted me on many levels.  I realize that autumn may bring a different set of strains.  But I am ready for the shift.

I have thought about previous early August trips I've made:  in 2022 to bring the first load of stuff to seminary for a year of on-campus housing, and several trips to Williamsburg to be with my parents under happier circumstances.  In 2021, we were making trips back and forth between the house we were soon to sell and the downtown condo that we were renting while figuring out what to do next.  These trips often seem like a change in key, to use a musical term.  Let's see what this August trip brings, whether the key will be to a major or a minor.

Seasonal Disarray

Yesterday I realized it was the last day to use a coupon at Michaels, the kind of coupon that I got because of past spending.  It was only for $5.00, but I will need a new sketchbook soon.

Yes, I have sketchbooks, but I use a particular type for my early morning practice.

It has been so long since I went to a retail place that I forgot what a nightmare it can be:  more shoppers, more traffic, that kind of nightmare.  I was hoping for a seasonal respite, since retail places are usually months ahead.  I was looking forward to some early autumnal vibes.

No such luck.  I came home and made this Facebook post:

"Went to Michaels to use $5.00 off coupon that expires at the end of the day--I was hoping for an autumnal infusion, but the place was in disarray, just like my sense of the season: clearance priced summer beach stuff mixed with incoming Halloween stuff, along with random baking supplies on sale and back to school supplies of unmarked prices. With my coupon and the buy one, get one at 50% off deal, I did get a free sketchbook when I bought one sketchbook, so at least I was able to get what I came for--in fact, double what I came for!"

The Hinge Festival of Lammas

 Early August is a hinge point in the calendar. In some ways, it's not as obvious a hinge as the autumnal equinox or the summer solstice; in fact, it's the time directly between those two hinges--we're as far away from the start of summer as we are from the start of autumn. But in some ways, it's just as significant a point of seasonal shift.

If we lived in medieval England, we would be celebrating the festival of Lammas, a festival that celebrates first harvests with loaves of bread standing in for that first harvest.  There might be processions to bakeries, to bless them and to bless the bakers.  

It would be a festival that celebrates abundance, the abundance that comes later in a cooler climate.  Of course, we here in Appalachia are celebrating that abundance too, with piles of zucchini showing up at every gathering for people to take.

We may have slogged through summer long enough that we may feel that nothing will ever change--it will be hot and humid forever. The light hasn't changed significantly, the way it will in a month or two. But we are losing more daylight each day as we hurtle towards a different season. Students aren't in school yet, but the time draws closer. Most of us aren't agricultural people anymore, but if we were, we'd be seeing crops in their final ripening. Harvest would be coming soon.


Now is a good time to take an accounting. Have we been planning some summer festivities that we haven't gotten to do yet? Now is the time. Do we need to adjust our trajectories for the rest of the year? Let us make some plans.