[So, today was actually the last day of the class. We've had so much work, I haven't had time to type any of my writing up to post. I'll try to get caught up over the next few days, but I still have a ton of writing to do to finish my portfolio and stuff by July 9.]
Writing Into The Day 6/12: Response to Linda Ellis' "The Dash"
I've seen this particular poem a number of times, but the place and time it takes me to is September 2004, to the memorial service for my maternal grandmother. My dad, her son-in-law, chose the poem (which struck me a little because they often didn't get along). But I spent some time at the service, and since, thinking about my grandmother, and her "dash".
Our relationship was sometimes a rocky one: I felt she was stern and boring--my other grandmother, if she'd seen the kids playing in the dirt, would join us; my mom's mother would tell us to stop getting dirty. It wasn't until she had passed away that I learned some details about her dash.
Born in 1907, she lived through the Great War, the Roaring Twenties, the Depression, World War II. In her teens, she exercised cavalry horses with her sister on the nearby army base. She and my grandfather, both teachers, married in secret in the 1930's and kept it a secret for several years. You see, female teachers back then couldn't be married; married women should be at home starting families. My grandmother loved her job teaching shorthand and typing, and didn't want to give it up. She was stubborn like that. I've been told I inherited some of her stubbornness--I don't see it.
[Funny side note: My grandfather had played baseball in college and was offered a position on a farm team for Philadelphia. He turned it down because he loved teaching, and because you couldn't make any money playing professional baseball.]
My grandmother had my mom at age 36, the same age I had my first child. My mom was a preemie, in an incubator for the first few weeks of her life, and my grandparents did not try again. I often wondered what my mom's childhood was like, living with my un-fun German grandmother. My grandfather was the fun one: he loved jokes, took my mother to Flyers games, and even let her have a pet squirrel. I never heard of my grandmother joining in such antics. She always came across as the killjoy in my mom's stories, not liking the squirrel, not attending the sporting events, not enjoying the practical jokes.
I often felt gypped growing up--my grandfather had passed away at age 63 four years before I was born. I wondered why I was stuck with the boring grandparent and never got to know the fun one. My grandmother always wanted me to be a girl. Now, I AM a girl, but she wanted me to be a girly-girl. Every year for my birthday or Christmas or Easter--holidays for which she was frequently present, since most of her family was gone and my mom was an only child--my grandmother would give me a sweatshirt. Pink or mint green or peach (which is really NOT my color), one had knitting sheep on it, another had ballet-dancing teddy bears, and the third had seashells outlined in glittery puff paint. My God. Had I worn those to school, or even out of the house, I would have been a laughing stock. Gifts from my grandmother were acknowledged with a "thank you" and then tucked away in a drawer or on a shelf in my closet, waiting for an opportunity to put them in a rummage sale at church or give away to a younger associate who was more receptive to glitter paint and knitting sheep.
I don't know if I understand even now the intent of my grandmother's gifts; did she know so little about me that she thought I'd really like a sweatshirt with ballet-dancing teddy bears as a sophomore in high school, or she wanted me to be the kind of girl who would like such a thing, or she viewed me as being girlier than I was, or she wanted me to BE girlier, or she simply didn't know me well enough to know what I'd like, or she didn't know my age group or generation well enough to know what I'd like...and now, I think, was it because I never took the time to LET her get to know me well enough?
There may have been a lot about me that my grandmother didn't know, but there was also a lot about her that I didn't know. I will probably never know those things about her. My mother has passed away as well, and my father doesn't know or doesn't remember a lot of stories from my mother's family. My grandmother's brother and sister are long gone as well, and I haven't stayed in touch with my mother's cousins, the only other living relatives from my mother's side of the family that I know still exist. I should check with my father and see if he has their addresses. I inherited all my mother's family photo albums when she died; I see faces in fading black and white photos that look vaguely familiar, but most of the pictures aren't labeled. I turn the pages in silence, and mourn the loss of family that I never knew I had. I also mourn the family that I did have, but didn't ever take the time to know. I know my grandmother probably had a hell of a dash. I just wish I knew more of the story.
6/12 How might the reading, writing, and discussions that you've experienced here inform your work? What are the implications for your work?
Prior to the institute, I had essentially no training in IEFA. Oh, I had a few handbooks, and I think I might have sat through a conference session or two, but nothing other than that, and those obviously hadn't made much impression on me. I knew we had required IEFA texts at every level, although not in every semester, and the only ones I've taught are The Winter People and The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. This institute is giving me far more resources than I knew existed as far as material I can use in my classroom and ways I can relate it to the texts we already discuss, but more importantly it's given me an understanding of WHY it matters to do so. High school is such a marginalizing experience anyway; if I can make it less so, I will.
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