Texas gardening

I've moved every summer for the past six years. But this year, I'm staying put, so I decided to plant a garden. You know, grow some roots or something.

Bright and early on Friday morning (well, bright, at least) I pulled into a feed store, where the accents were about as thick as the Texas summer heat. Maybe even thicker.


(I didn't have my camera with me, so this picture is from Denton RC.)

I squeezed my little Honda into the row of pickup trucks filled with mulch and fertilizer and walked up, noticing that I was the only customer not wearing either overalls or a long floral dress. Farmers and ranchers were ordering supplies while old couples planned their flower gardens and a man on a forklift loaded bags of soil into trucks. "Where'd you get them freckles," I heard, and I looked up to see a man with a belly so big his overalls wouldn't button around it. He helped me make my plant selections and told me how to get my tomatoes to grow on a patio. "The mainest thing is your soil," he said. So he helped me pick out fertilizer and compost.

After I'd chosen fertilizer, compost, six plants, and four pots, I went inside the musty little feed store filled with seeds, coyote traps, sulfur fertilizer, and old John Deere signs. An old man was sitting behind the counter offering farming advice to customers and scratching out sums in a little notepad. Dennis was his name. "Now, you can buy that compost at Calloway's, but it'll cost you 18 bucks," he was telling a woman. Another old man in worn out overalls sat sprawled out on a bench across from the counter talking with the customers crowding the building (because who wouldn't want to sit and chill in a feed store?).

"Where d'ya want us to load your bags?" Dennis asked. "Oh, out there into that car with the dog in it," said the customer. So the assistant hauled the bags over his shoulder and carried them out to the car with the dog.

"How's Merwin's finger," Dennis asked a lady a little farther down the line, and all I thought was, "Thank you, Lord, that you orchestrated my steps so that at this place, at this time, I'd be standing right here to hear that sentence." The other customers gathered around, and each chimed in with advice for Merwin's finger. The man on the bench recommended a special ointment he had. "It looks like water, but it acts like medicine," was the glowing praise.

Dennis answered the phone right as I was stepping to the counter, so his assistant started jotting down the prices of my purchases on the back of a feed catalog. My two unpriced buckets confused him. "How much are these two little'uns?" he asked. I thought he was asking Dennis, but he must have been asking the public at large. "They's half the size, they oughta be half the price," one customer volunteered. "How 'bout two dollars?" another suggested. "$2.50?" "$2.75?" The whole store had convened to help solve this puzzle. I began to think that I ought to jump in and say something if the prices of my pots were going to be decided democratically.

And just so we're clear:



Not half the size.

Fortunately, Dennis got off the phone at that point, and he was called upon to settle the dispute that was throwing the whole store into a frenzy. "Hell, I don't know," was his helpful response. "How 'bout $1.50?" So 1.50 it was. After that he made a few scribbles on his notepad, gave me the total, and his assistant helped me carry everything to my car.

After a trip to Home Depot to get a spade and morning glory seeds and a few hours of mixing soil and planting, I ended up with this cute little patio. Hopefully things will grow.

Grad class, possums, and golden cockroaches

After I stopped teaching third grade, I thought my days of drama and thrill in the classroom were over. And while it's true that grad school classrooms lack the little adventures of elementary school like kids puking on textbooks or bursting into tears for no reason ("Sergio, why are you crying?" "I don't know!"), they're not completely devoid of excitement.

Last week's adventure started when one grad student announced to the professor that another student would be late because she was catching a possum. Yes, a possum. About 15 minutes later, in walked said student, carrying with her a banker's box emitting suspicious scratching sounds. "There's not a possum in there?" the professor asked. She said yes, there was, but it was just a baby. She perched the box precariously on top of a desk, and then our discussion of psychic space was suspended while we heard the story:

Apparently, animal control had come and removed a family of possums from campus, but they had forgotten this one lone baby. She saw it and knew it would die and decided that she could catch it and raise it as her own.

Now, I'm a compassionate person. I like animals (from a distance). I hate ending the life of even an ant. I went frog gigging once, but just the remembrance of that spear piercing the poor frog makes me shudder. As a child, the only way I could keep from crying when an adult killed a cockroach was by telling myself that murdered cockroaches would turn into pure gold and travel to their own special insect heaven. But possums, well, possums are just gross.

I mean, look at that.



I don't care if it's a cute tiny baby; it's still gonna grow into that disgusting creature. Possums are the type of animals you fight to keep out of your yard. I remember neighbors setting traps for possums. One took to standing on the edge of his yard and waving golf clubs at them. Armadillos may be responsible for leaving huge claw-sized holes in yards, but possums are the only greenbelt animal I can remember learning to hate.

And there we sat in class, trying to discuss Lacan and Foucault and the colonization of psychic space while this disgusting animal scratched and scurried and poked its whiskery nose out of the handles of the box. I don't think I can be faulted for not focusing much on our discussion.

Baby girl

This is my little girl. Today she turns six.



Three years ago I didn't know she existed. Two years ago I watched her open gifts from the foster care agency. A year ago she had forgotten how to smile. And today she turns six.

This girl is the bravest, most beautiful, most forgiving person I know. They say that children are resilient, and they are right, but that doesn't make Caitlin any less incredible to me.

Caitlin is gorgeous. With the best smile that crinkles her nose just right.

She can't wait for her four big sisters to be married and have babies. We tell her she'd better be patient.

She wants her toenails painted, her lips shiny with lip gloss, and purple eyeshadow covering her eyes. She'd really love to have a boyfriend right now.

She believes in fairy tales and princesses.

When I see her she jumps in my arms. I wonder how she's still so great at loving.

If I have any say in the matter, I'm gonna lock her up between the ages of 14 and 17. Lock her up in a high, high tower. That always goes well, right?

Happy Birthday, Baby Girl!

Teacher Reality Show

The Bachelor, Toddlers and Tiaras, American Idol, Jersey Shore -- reality TV shows are all the rage. I've never been too into them, but last night I thought of one I wouldn't mind having on my DVR.

First of all, I'd gather up a few politicians, reporters, newscasters, and other public figures who believe that education funds should be cut and that teachers have too many benefits. I'd put them each in a room with 20-25 children who speak several different languages, come from a variety of cultures and backgrounds, and are at different levels developmentally.

They would have to:

-Keep all students safe -- safe from falling off the monkey bars, being bullied, eating markers, skinning knees, and getting their feelings hurt.

-Organize 25 desks and chairs, five computers, 50 tissue boxes, 200 text books, a TV, both a Spanish and English word wall, a classroom library, teacher manuals, math games, a hamster cage, a calendar center, workbooks, student supplies and jackets, and 75 bottles of Germ-X for an optimal learning environment.

-Provide emotional stability for the student whose father is abusing him, the one whose mom walked out on her, and the one who has everything except someone to tell her "no."

-Ensure that all 25 students eat at least two healthy meals a day, which means keeping a snack box on hand for the child who missed breakfast, monitoring lunchtime to tell students to eat their fruit before their dessert, and keeping track of all student lunch numbers so that they can order food.

-Observe all students carefully for developmental delays. When a handicap is recognized, convince the parents, arrange for testing for the child, fill out the appropriate mountain of paperwork, and provide the student with suitable resources.

-Teach students honesty, how to walk in a straight line, which containers can be recycled, diligence, what clothes to wear for each season, courtesy, how to organize their desks, appropriate methods for expressing anger, nutrition, how to eat with utensils, how to clean the floor, table manners, respect, patriotism, conflict resolution, and how to wash their hands.

-Maintain three-inch-and-growing folders on each child recording grades, behavior, testing scores, interactions with parents, free-lunch paperwork, permission slips, doctors notes, and school photos.

-Plan lessons, grade papers, design bulletin boards, display student work, maintain good relations with parents, and attend professional development seminars. And all within a 45-min planning period and a 20-min lunch.

-Know each student well enough to recommend the perfect book at a moment's notice, tailor a lesson to his or her needs, and know the best discipline strategy for that child.

-Challenge each student academically -- from the student who has known how to read from the age of two to the student who just moved to the U.S. and has illiterate parents.

-Get each child -- no matter the language, no matter the background, no matter whether that child was part of the group who came to the class not able to count or the one who is ready for algebra -- to score between a 75 and 100 on The Test.

The participants who merely fulfill these requirements will probably be kicked off the show for lack of dedication. The truly dedicated ones will be the the ones who tutor after school and on the weekends, who attend soccer games every Saturday, who lie awake brainstorming ways to help a particular child succeed.

For meeting all of these responsibilities, for coming into work an hour before and staying three hours later than they are contractually obligated, for the constant stress of knowing that these young people, their families, and this country, is counting on them doing their jobs well, the participants will be paid 45k plus benefits.

Then we'll try asking them if teachers are being paid too much or if class sizes should be increased.

Now that's one reality show I could really get into.

Flying my flag

On Wednesday I woke up before my alarm with that tickly excited feeling that you get when you know it's a special day. Wednesday, as you fellow Texans know, was our Texas Independence Day, but that wasn't the sole source of my excitement. No, March 2nd is an important day not only because of Texas' birthday but also because it marks my half-birthday.

After my morning run, I checked fb and my text messages for well wishes from family and friends. I wasn't disappointed. Number 3 had written on my wall, "texas independence day? check. half-birthday? check. what a great day to be alive!" Numbers 2 and 4 wrote me later that day, and my mom sent a text message.

The celebration of half-birthdays has a long and rich history in my family. My dad wanted more birthday cake than he could have with only four kids. OK, so maybe it's not too long or rich, but I still like it. "It's either celebrate their half birthdays or have more kids," I remember him telling inquisitors. (Years later, my parents would adopt four more kids. Hmmm.)

The half-birthday celebration was always simple. We got to choose what Mom made for dinner, the sisters would make us homemade gifts (like the pipe cleaner jump roping figure I made for one of them one year), and we would fly our flag.



Starting with our third birthday, my mom embroidered a patch for our flags each year. We'd fly the flags on birthdays and half-birthdays. Seeing that flag hanging in front of the house meant that I was the queen, the most important person in the world, at least in that house, at least for that day.



I didn't have my flag with me this year, but I still took myself out to tacos for lunch and spent the day imagining that my flag was flying high, letting the world know that March 2nd is my day.

If you were my sibling...

First, if you were this little punk, you'd sneak into my purse and find a comic book, which you would take without asking. I'd forgive you, though.



If you were this huge 4th grader, you'd beg me to take you to Harry Potter, and I would, because I'm just that great. While we were walking into the theater, you would say quite loudly, "As soon as we sit down, I'm going to start cuddling with you," and I would smile and wish that you would never grow any older.

If you were one of my little brothers, I might take you to my apartment in Denton. I would make you blondies, which we would eat while we watched (preselected) episodes of Smallville. That night I'd turn the heat off in my apartment and pile mountains of blankets on top of you. You'd tell me that was way better than sleeping with the heat on. The next morning, we'd go to Oldwest Cafe, where I would give each of you five dollars to spend on hot chocolate and chocolate chip pancakes.



If you were one of these cuties, I'd bring you to Denton for a sleepover, and we'd stop at the mall for a few hours. You'd try on the highest heels you could find at DSW. I'd take you to the pet store, where you would pet the puppies. When you cuddled up to me and told me how cute the dogs were, I would know exactly what you were trying to do, but I wouldn't give in. Four little siblings is enough; I don't need a pet too.

I'd give you 75 cents to ride the helicopter, and then we'd go to Bath and Body Works, where we'd try on every lotion we could find.



In the morning, I'd let you help me make biscuits and chocolate gravy.



After breakfast, we'd gather every pillow in the apartment and pile them high in the kids' bedroom. You'd build mountains and forts and jump and climb.



You'd think it was pretty great.

Of course, if you were one of my little siblings, you'd also tell me over and over (unprompted, of course) that I am your favorite big sister ever.

Great expectations

On Friday I graded the last of my students' finals and finished all of my paperwork. After a three-hour nap and a trip to the gym, I was ready to join the family in Dallas for a couple days. We had great plans for Saturday -- lots of free time and relaxing with family, maybe Harry Potter with the little brother, and a sisters' outing at night.

Life with little kids doesn't afford much free time, though. Will had a piano recital at 1:30, and Nathan had a basketball game at 4. The sisters and I planned a night at Billy Bob's, which meant that I'd have to take Nathan to the 10:30 showing of Harry Potter. Relaxation Plan foiled.

When Nathan and I pulled into the movie theater at 10:15 on Saturday morning, the building was suspiciously empty. "Our first movie isn't till 11," the employees grumbled at us when we tried buying tickets. No problem, I reassured the bro. We'll just go get snacks at Target before the movie. But the Target had gone out of business, so we went to a gas station instead. We returned to the movies half an hour later, purchased tickets, and found our theater. Then we looked at the time on the tickets. 12:30. I had to tell a very disappointed little brother that his movie would have to wait. Harry Potter Plan foiled.

Next event: Will's piano recital. I went for a run before lunch and ended up being about 15 minutes late to the recital. No worries, I thought. These things take forever anyway. Unfortunately, Will had been the first kid to perform. Recital Plan foiled.

After the recital, Sister #3 and I joined #2 at Nathan's basketball game. We got there almost on time and waited for a while for the other team to show up. They didn't. Forfeit. Instead we watched a scrimmage. Basketball Plan foiled.

#3 and I did a bit of shopping and then drove home to put on boots for Billy Bob's with #2. We drove an hour to Ft. Worth, paid the parking attendant, and faced a line wrapping halfway around the seven-acre honky tonk. After waiting half an hour or so, #3 had the genius idea of checking to see if getting in was even an option. It wasn't. Tickets were sold out, for both the concert and for general admission. Billy Bob's Plan foiled.

Still hoping for a fun night out, the girls and I decided to drive to Dallas and hit up the Idle Rich Pub. We found a great parking spot and marched up to the uptown pub in our honky tonk duds, eager to grab a booth and talk for a few hours. But #3 isn't 21 yet, and they wouldn't let her in. Outing Plan foiled.

I drove back to Denton and went to bed. Ending the day seemed like a good idea.

When we get lost

Every time I drive my siblings around, they beg me to get lost. And given my nonexistent skills with a map, this is a pretty fortunate arrangement.

It all started last week when I dropped my mom off at the airport on Saturday morning. The two little girls were in the back, snug in their car seats, rather grumpy from waking up too early. Getting back to my parents' house from DFW is very easy. If you take the north exit, that is. The south exit will shoot you into a spinning maze of turnpikes and toll roads and overpasses. I took the south exit.

We drove around in circles for a while, the girls growing more and more restless. Even three- and five-year-olds can tell when they're being driven in circles. I stopped at an empty parking lot to let them run around while I looked at a map, but they were too cold. So we buckled in and hit the road again.

Then I had my brilliant idea. Getting lost with Courtney = Donuts! That way, instead of associating getting lost with frustrating car rides around Dallas, they'll think of donuts. Brilliant, I know.

Fortunately, donut shops are easy to find. We stopped at one, ate and relaxed, and then I called a friend who always gives understandable directions. "What happens when you get lost with me?" I asked the kids when we pulled into the parents' driveway 45 minutes later. "We get donuts!" the five-year-old shouted.

Since then, whenever I make a wrong turn, I hear a chorus of little voices asking, "Are we lost? Do we get donuts?"

Busted knee ≠ chicken pox

I grew up as a book-lover in an athletic family. I always trailed behind the rest of the family during family bike rides. On ski trips, I asked if I could bring a book along and just ride the ski lift around and around. I was the kid who never scored in soccer games.

Then, this summer I started running with my coworkers in Mexico, and I was shocked at how much I enjoyed it. So I continued. I planned on running a half marathon in November and trained by running the 15K trail around White Rock Lake as often as I could. Things were progressing according to plan when, a week before the race, my knee suddenly gave out. I spent three days on the couch with frozen berries on my knee (I was too cheap to buy ice trays.) and decided that the race was doomed.

Instead, I set my sights on the eight-mile Turkey Trot race in Dallas on Thanksgiving. My family runs the race every year, but I always stick to the three-mile version. Sister #3 said that she would run with me, so I began retraining.

As the days of training dwindled, I kept an eye on the weather. I can't stand the cold. I'd rather run in the gnat-infested humidity of a Texas summer than the drizzle of cold any day. Thursday's temperature was forecasted at freezing, with rain. The Turkey Trot must be run, though. I decided that if I could run a 15K in sunny weather, I'd be able to run the race in the cold.

I grew up with athletes. I know what tapering is supposed to look like. I know that it doesn't mean running a hard run three days before a race, especially a hard run that likes to destroy knees. I just assumed it wouldn't happen again.

It did. I ran around the lake on Monday afternoon. By the next day, my knee wouldn't bend. #3 called to tell me that she was tapering for a swim meet and couldn't run the race with me, and I told her it was fine, that I wouldn't be running the eight-mile anyway. I tried explaining to her what had happened. "I just thought bad knees were like chicken pox," I said. "Once you catch it once, it won't happen again." She laughed.

So I'm back to short runs. I miss the lake, though, and I'm beginning to wonder: Can you catch a bad knee three times?

Firemen, flirtations, and bloody noses

I am single, and it is largely because Wolverine has held my heart for years and I just can't bring myself to give it to another man.

I did, however, have second thoughts last week when I saw two handsome firemen sitting in the booth next to mine at Chick-fil-A. I did the quick glance-over -- flat stomach, decent arms, no ring on finger (Do firemen wear rings?), young, but not too young.

I heard the voices of my sisters telling me to flirt, so I did a quick self-evaluation. Pros: dressed all right for a Saturday, hard stomach from lots of running, jeans freshly washed and not yet baggy. Cons: the crew of little children sharing the bench with me.

I keep my little siblings on most weekends. I really enjoy being with them and sharing in their lives, but it does make it harder to form adult relationships. I sat in that booth, reading cow comics with the nine-year-old and watching the three-year-old play and pondered my situation.

I've been mistaken for a mom since I was 14, so I really couldn't comfort myself with thoughts that I looked too young. Probably, I looked like a single mom with way too many kids for her age, and who's interested in that? Plus, how do I even go about flirting while I'm watching a gaggle of youngsters? I got up and down to get the kids ketchup more often than was needed, walking slowly past the fireman table each time. Then I just started laughing. Even without kids, I'm a pretty poor flirter, but really? Ketchup retrieval? Not hot at all.

Too soon, the firemen were gone, and mere seconds later, the three-year-old came wailing out of the play area with blood streaming from her nose. I hushed her and carried her to the bathroom to stop the nosebleed. We came out a few minutes later, pale pink wet patches on my jeans from where I'd tried to scrub the blood out, and I was grateful that an elderly couple had replaced the firemen in the booth next to mine.

Maybe I'll just stick with Wolverine for now.

Culture shock and entitlement

I noticed culture shock in small ways throughout my first weeks back in Texas -- like when I wiggled my pointer finger to say "yes" or searched for the nearest taco stand after a hard day. I thought I was doing a pretty good job of re assimilating into American culture, though, until I started taking the school shuttle to campus. Have you ever noticed how strange public transportation is in the U.S.? How predictable and safe?

We have bus stops, and the bus stops at them. It will not stop at every corner. It will not stop at either side of the intersection. And it will not stop in the middle lane. It stops at the bus stops. And I've never seen a bus stop sign next to a sign that tells me I can't board, like this one in Puebla.



The buses are frequent and predictable here. I have never waited 20 or 30 minutes for a bus. Neither have I seen three of the same buses racing each other and ignoring all the people gesturing for rides.

The buses wait for passengers. On my first day riding the bus in Denton, I saw a kid walking up as the bus was getting ready to depart. He wasn't running or waving his arms, and his face didn't wear the expression of panic I always felt when I was trying to persuade a stopped bus to wait for me. He looked sure of the fact that he would be getting a ride, like he was entitled to it. Such an American.

The buses stop for passengers. They really stop. I was standing at the bus stop the other morning with about half a dozen other people. As the bus pulled up, I walked right up to the edge of the curb. No one else budged. Then, once the bus had stopped and rocked back, the people started moving. Such a waste of time.

The rock back motion is important, I'm realizing. Inside the bus, no one stands up until it has rocked back. In Puebla, I don't think the bus ever stopped long enough to rock back. When boarding the bus, I learned to grab the handles before stepping in, because as soon as one foot was in the bus, the driver was off. Dismounting was a trickier feat, requiring plenty of planning and courage as I prepared several blocks in advance for my heroic leap to the pavement below as the bus briefly slowed down.

The buses are quiet and ... boring. Where's the blaring 90's music that made me feel like I was on the roller rink? Where are the psychedelic pictures of Jesus? Where are the crucifixes and horses' hooves hanging from the rear view mirror? Passengers never hang out of doors when the buses get crowded. The buses always go the speed limit. I never fear for my life.

Even after several weeks of riding the bus here in Denton, I haven't gotten used to it. I still mutter under my breath that we are wasting time when passengers take so long to dismount. I still inch forward to the curb when I see my bus approaching. And I still wonder why these Americans feel entitled to a safe, quiet ride on the bus.

I miss blogging

I've started graduate school, which requires plenty of writing. Also, life provides far fewer stories now that I'm no longer teaching eight-year-olds or living out of the US. Hence, no blog posts.

But I miss light, easy writing. So maybe I'll start again.

You know it's a Texas summer when ...

In honor of a full week of temperatures between 105 and 110 degrees, I thought I'd provide some clues to let you know when you're smack dab in the middle of a Texas summer.

-Your sister tells you that if you're going to run in the morning, you'd better be back before 7 a.m.
-To avoid heat stroke, you have to leave the pool by noon.
-Your little brother stands outside watching the spray from a sprinkler evaporate.
-The heat makes you shiver and gives you goose bumps.
-The best survival strategy in the afternoon is to pull the shades, turn off the lights, and sleep through the heat.
-Your sisters discuss using the car to bake cookies.
-The dollar theater is your best friend, but only if your parking spot is close to the front door.
-The bugs swimming through the humidity make an evening run both a workout and a protein shake all in one.
-You complain with everyone else but secretly feel proud each fall for surviving yet another Texas summer.

The end

My time here is done. A year ago, I was making my final decision, never dreaming how right it was.

I finished teaching on June 29th. I taught my students "Leaving on a Jet Plane," and we sang it together while they cried (SUCCESS!). I packed up my classroom and finished paperwork the following day. Since then, I've just been chilling at the school. I visited friends, read, napped, emailed, and got paid -- a pretty good setup, really. Now, though, that's all over. I've said my goodbyes, packed up my belongings, paid my last bills, and eaten my last tacos. I'm gonna miss this place.

Now I'm off to grad school, but I'll never forget the year I spent down here or the friends I made. Goodbye, Mexico.

Crossed signals

I get my stellar directional skills from my dad. We're both wonders with a map. Take the time I spent two hours trying to find my way home from the DFW airport, for example. Several days ago, my dad told me he had a great deal on a ticket and was going to visit me for a couple of days. He would be flying into Mexico City. Puebla is a couple of hours away from D.F., and since his trip was so short, I decided I'd come pick him up. That way, we'd be able to spend a few more hours together and I wouldn't have to worry about him finding his way to me.

I left on time, a bit early even. I arrived at the airport in time. I waited where I said I would wait. For three hours. Just when I was considering calling my family in Texas to find out if my dad had actually left, my phone rang. It was a taxi driver, calling for someone named Mark. I asked to speak to him. My dad was waiting outside of my apartment in Puebla. "See you in two and a half hours," I told him.

OK, so maybe our communication skills aren't great, but we still had fun. We ate tacos Sunday night (about all we had time to do after our miscommunication), attended a wedding (an exciting experience for my dad), toured Puebla, and celebrated the 4th of July with my coworkers (which ended in a conga line and salsa dancing). Plus, I got to see the Mexico City airport one more time! Who wouldn't give up eight hours of his or her Sunday for a chance like that?