That Looks Good

We had our annual international movie day today at school. The film we showed was Not One Less by my favorite Chinese director, Zhang Yimou. It was a good movie, and the kids liked it, and after a day immersed in images of China? We're having Chinese food tonight.

Culture Shock

Believe it or not, there is such a thing as middle school wrestling. I say this, because despite my 20 years in a middle school, I am one of the incredulous. Oh, I go to the meets to support my students, past and present, who wrestle, but I'm never there more than thirty seconds before I feel my face physically contorting in shock and consternation. I literally must massage the alarm out of my expression.

Set aside the snug, uniform "singlet" that all wrestlers sport, and even the practice of waiting on hands and knees as your opponent takes his position above you, the rest of the competition still seems very inappropriate to the uninitiated, especially those of us who spend our days discouraging practically everything the wrestling coach wants the athletes to do.

Let's put it this way: Instead of "Get him!" I want to yell "Get off him!"

Could Have Been

There was a segment on Marketplace this evening about the unreliability of memory. It seems that some researchers showed dozens of people photo-shopped images of news events past, and many of the test subjects conjured memories of them. Not only were they convinced that they remembered the fictional incidents, but some also recalled their emotional reactions at the time.

That doesn't surprise me in the least. As a bit of a memoirist myself, I know how slippery the past, even the very recent past, can be. My only defense, when challenged, is that I have presented the story as I recall it, and I claim to do no more or less than that.

Even so, someone else's faulty memory can be stunning. Once I posted a picture of me and my high school roommates. Taken in December of 1977, we are all wearing matching striped pajamas that one of the other girls in the photo gave us. It was a few days before Christmas break, and we had all immediately donned the jammies the minute we opened our packages.

What else would we do but take a picture? I recollect it so clearly: I propped my Minolta SR-T 101 on a chair and set up the auto-feature. There were 15 seconds on the timer, but on my way back to the group I tripped. As I rolled over, my friends grabbed my shoulders and pulled me up into the frame just as the shutter snapped. Of course we were all laughing.

Several folks from those days posted comments on the picture, including this one:  

Actually, wasn't this taken the year I was there? This was taken in Karen and Liz's room. In fact, I'm sure I took the picture.

That's just not how I remember it.

My Pogo

We had a conference today where the parent called her daughter by a nickname the whole time. Not so unusual, really, most Sams were once Sammys and some Kennys have even been Brandons at home, but this girl happens to be Sweet Face to her family.

It was cute, if a little distracting. Truth be told, she does have a very sweet face. Later when I was telling a colleague about it, another teacher came into the room. "We were just talking about Sweet Face," I told her.

"Did someone call you that?" she joked.

"Oh... to be honest? I'm afraid everyone calls me that behind my back," I said. "In fact, it might just be my pogo.*"

*Making fun of your friends about something annoying that they do, all behind their backs. Coined by the show New Girl.

Retrospect

"Will you fix this book for me?" a student asked this morning.

"Sure," I agreed without looking up; as far as I'm concerned, book repair is part of the job. I have a ready supply of packing and duct tape for just such occasions. "Where is it?"

She handed me a ragged lilac-colored volume and its sundered cover. I literally gasped. It was the exact same edition of Little Women that I received for Christmas the year I was in sixth grade. The very one that I read and loved with all my heart, probably just about this time of year 39 years ago.

"Where did you get this?" I asked in wonder.

She shrugged. "It's my mom's."

I flipped to the page facing the first chapter. A pen an ink drawing of a man in a topcoat tipping his hat to a young woman on the street with the caption, May I go also, and take for you the bundles?" sent a jolt of recognition right through me.

I reattached the cover and then paged through a little more, looking at the chapter headings, Aunt March Settles the Question, Lazy Laurence, and so forth, but than I returned to that first illustration, out of place, at the beginning of the book. I remembered how it bothered me back when I first read it.

Jo March? Why in the world would she marry Professor Baer, especially after rejecting Laurie? Duh! That girl was clearly gay!

The Temple

This winter it's been damn hard to find a decent clementine. My theory is that they (and we) are victims of their success. Fifteen years ago, when the charming wooden crates of these delightful fruits began to appear, it seemed impossible to get a bad one. From November to March, we feasted on perfectly tart, seedless little citrus gems. The Spanish beauties festooned our holiday tables and rounded out our brown bag lunches in their bright unassuming way.

Now? They come from Spain, they come from Morocco, they come from California, and they even come from South America in the summer time, but despite this bounty, their quality is spotty. Clever distributors have designed a bright orange mesh to sell them in, making it impossible to see the true color of the fruit, much less its size or the texture of the rind. Everybody loves clementines, but not many of us get what we hoped for once we open the package.

It's to the point where I ask anyone who has a decent looking specimen where it was obtained, and I confess to driving way out of my way just to find some good clementines.

Thankfully, there is another orange that is just as satisfying.  I remember my mother buying Temple oranges when I was a little girl. They were always cheaper than the smooth-skinned navals and Valencias, probably because they have A LOT of seeds, but to me they have always been superior-- easy to peel, always juicy, with a flawless balance of sweet and tart.

I don't feel that the Temple orange has received its proper due, but maybe that's a good thing. Their season is very short, so brief in fact that I forget about them from year to year until that day when I walk into the produce section and spy a stack.

Today, like that day every year, I clapped my hands and nearly skipped over to fill my plastic bag.

Shhhhh.

By the Shorts

We had a fun day today with my brother, sister-in-law, and nephew. It was our annual Oscar-nominated shorts marathon where we see both the animated and live action shows back to back. Even though I was a bit disappointed in the field this year-- I wanted to fall in love with something, but they were all just okay-- it was great company and an excellent shared experience seeing 10 good movies that we wouldn't otherwise.

And even better? We're going to the documentaries in a couple of weeks.