Jason

Jason said he wanted to start a blog with me and he never posts. So, I am going to post for him. Stream of conciousness Jason:

Tony Romo. Yes. Poor Bret Farve. I love him so much. Bret Farve. Bret Farve. I love you. Pinball. I am the pinball master. Why am I so good at pinball? What's for dinner? What should I make for dinner? Hot meat. Something meaty. Steak. Ribs. Turkey. I miss Thanksgiving. When does Leah get home? I'm hungry. Mom. I'll call Mom. No minutes. Football. Football. Football this weekend. Stupid Road Island guy won the powerball. I thought I was going to win. College football finally. Cable. Please. Hurry. Ulitimate fighting again. I hate Matt Hughes. Christain Bale was so skinny in that movie. He only ate oranges. I like oranges. The juicy ones. Really juicy ones.

Jason's mind blog would go something like that, only less ADD

I joined a writing group with high schoolers who are better than me at writing. It is so much fun. Our first topic was "masks." Here is my piece:

Angry people.

Minute bits of earth lay restless underneath my flimsy pathetic fingernails. Halfheartedly, I repair their cleanliness with my teeth and picture toilet handle soiled diaper feet remnants crawling into my open mouth. I don’t focus on these thoughts enough to really care. My piece of nail breaks, a plaything for my lonely tongue. No longer companioned by the rod that used to pierce through it, keeping it occupied in times of little adventure.
A shiny brunette cuddles me without permission. She tests my resistance. Close enough for uncomfort, she inches more. Her closeness implies a desire for intimacy, but I see past her devious trickery. She moves me. Quite literally. Away from her non-supple path. The fingernail moves from one cheek to the other.
My mood refuses to be affected by impolite passers-by. Janis prays for a color TV and a night on the town in my all alone world. Next door, a hooded sweatshirt beats frantically to this raspy tune. His appearance causes stares, and he relishes them. Some things are larger than they need be; I observe. His rhythmic trance is disrupted by an older model of him. The standoff is unpleasant. Angry limbs flail. The grey hood, once peacefully attached to a bobbing mop, flies backward in a silent shoulder-dropping slouch of disgust. Two middle fingers express their irritation. You dented, wobbling, overused man. The grey haired man who coughs substance smiles contently. His unsteady hands are locked around a steering circle. Woozy he glides zigzag. Is he impaired by substance or heart break? I zoom in. His gaze – a woman to his right.
She. Compact and opinionated. Her body tells me things I need to care about. Her back: an advertisement and a protest. I imagine, for lack of anything better to do, that I am her. My head itches. Detesting meat and conservative people. Humming a catchy, organic tune, I shed the heavy, constricting garb suffocating me and revel in the freedom of being naked in nature. I am vicariously high.
And of course my short-lived imaginary bliss is disrupted by a pushy, arrogant, chauvinistic, I-am-better-looking-and-worth-way-more-than-everyone-else-with-the-exception-of-very-big-breasted-women, supercilious, middle aged man. I choke for a bit, gagging on fingernail and men. A Large attitude in a sleek, petite exterior. He uses this smooth discourtesy to enter my personal space. He has the right of way. He is sure of it. Slow. Fast. In. Out. On top of me and I am breaking. On top of her. And him. Owning the way. I am pregnant with disgust.
Bloodshot eyes glare when I follow them at night. They never close, only get brighter sometimes. Lights tell me things like when to go. We march, ants in a perfect line, except ruder. We don’t have a queen. Ants know how to merge. We merge like a metal zipper on a sleeping bag.
Green and blue and rust, colors mix with yellow on grey. Eyes refuse to focus and everyone yells at me. They might be nice people sometimes? I mouth I’m sorry for crossing the line. There is no forgiveness here. No understanding. My grandma is afraid to cross the road with all the traffic. More angry people. Sitting behind steering wheels that meld them. Behind her he gets out of his car and stops traffic for her. My grandma crosses, so afraid. Old slow people. They can’t remember how to drive. Everyone shakes their heads or honks. They honk a lot. Too much. People are rushing. Always hurrying. I just want to get home. My fingernails are all short.

It is so nice to read something that breaks away from conventional novel writing. I was given a book last week. This book has words. And a story. Words blotted on the page like perfect sponge-paint. My mouth waters when I pick it up. Poetry. Point of view? A whole new world to me. Read Coming Through Slaughter by Michael Ondaatje.

What if you were walking along one of those streets that has all the cute little shops and you were window shopping looking for cheap stuff to buy and avoiding expensive boutiques and one store caught your eye so you went in. Then, when you were in the shop paroosing around looking at hats and shirts you noticed the music was pretty good, so you turned around and there was a live band playing some great tunes. So, you went over to the band to check them out and you realized all of the other shoppers were drinking deliscous looking chocolate beer. You see a bar in the middle of the store and order a beer and listen to live music and buy a cool book on how to press flowers and make things with them.

Well, lucky for us that happened to us yesterday when we went here and it was the coolest shopping adventure ever.

nomads of sorts

Well there comes a time to tell a story publicly (mostly to avoid having to tell and re-tell it). Jason and I have been moving around quite a bit as most people that read this blog will know. Our short stint in Willow Creek (the entire town is shown in the picture above)was ended with the ending of rafting season and the beginning of teaching on a crazy reservation. My first day went something like this:

Get to school, get all ready to teach stuff. Out side of my door: "F*ck that! You b*tch. Whatever A**hole, you are such a D*ick. Ha Ha! You Sl*t." Mind you, I am teaching 8th grade.
So we start our day. Introductions, syllabus... "Okay, class. I want you to write one paragraph about your summer. It can be about anything that you did this summer. Make it your best. I want to see how you write."
"How long does the paragraph have to be?"
"Five to seven sentences," I answer.
The students groaned. "Five to seven?!"
"Yes. You can do it."
My five minute writing warm up took 45 minutes.
Later...
We go to P.E. (Because I am a P.E. teacher now?) My students mob over to the gym. I am a sheep Herder. Some decide to go astray. They walk across the street. I chase them down. In the gym students are crawling on the bleachers, running in circles, and definitely not stretching (as I asked them to do first thing, before I brought them there.)
Next is intervention. I am supposed to help individual kids that I don't know work on skills they need to work on. Study hall of sorts? It is nearly 100 degrees in the classroom and we don't have AC. Two of the students break our fan by sticking pens in it. Other students throw there pencils at the ceiling to see if they will stick. Others decide it is cooler outside, and leave the room. I am a guard. Standing in front of the door.
My day ends with, "Some of the other guys wanted me to tell you... You have a great ass."
Could I handle this chaos? Maybe. Could I tame these crazies? Possibly. But I really didn't want to.

So, I quit my job. After three days.

Jason didn't like his job much either. In fact, he hated it. The owners of the golf course were pushing 100 and had shallow pockets.

So we moved to beautiful Colorado. (We made a map of the west coast and closed our eyes and threw a dart at it). Here we are in the Springs enjoying the mountains without Mormons. We almost took a few jobs at a ski resort, but decided that we didn't want to be that broke. So I took a job at Calhan High School. So far so good. I have been here a week and haven't lost any students yet. Oh yeah, and we don't have school on Mondays! How cool is that?!

There we are. I have officially lived in 5 states since I graduated college.

Life is a $.25 candy machine. Fork out the change purse and satify your salivating tongue. Or, just grab a hammer and smash it to pieces; don't worry, there's enough skittles to go around.