*Insert Smiley and Terrified Face*

I am writing from a brand-new desk having woken up on my very first morning in my new home. The windows let in sunshine, even with the blinds closed and it makes the place cheery and peaceful. My desk (well, technically, it's not brand-new; I found it on Craigslist) holds my VSC covenant, an over-stuffed basket of pens and pencils, a Bible-verse-a-Day calendar (Psalm 50:1), my Bible, an empty frame waiting for a 5x7 photograph, and a shopping list (dish soap, chair). Behind me and to my side are the bits and pieces that I left last night when unpacking got the best of me emotionally and I gave up in favor of making phone calls.

A few half-packed boxes aside, I am officially moved into the 'burg! I have a beautiful home in a townhouse, which means I have my own room, a beautiful kitchen, some hard-to-arrange common space, and a tiny yard with a uniform pattern of bushes and flowers. I have yet to meet my roommate, but she left me a couch and armchair and some dishes. My parents and I packed the minivan full of furniture, and they helped me move in and set up my desk, dresser, bed, and kitchen table.

After we grabbed dinner, they headed out and I discovered that everything you do at a time of transition acquires meaning. After taking an emotionally-laden trip to the grocery store (to purchase necessities such as milk, oatmeal, and tea), I opened up boxes and began to organize. Of course, I grew too unstable for this task and made a couple phone calls. When people failed to pick up, my emotions, of course, became even more charged and I set up my computer, and emotionally charged event. After making contact some with the outside world (and receiving a return phone call) I took an emotionally-laden shower. I think you get the picture.

I woke up only once or twice in the night and morning came bright and sunny. I start work in one hour. Between a job, a place of my own, and the bills that will come all too soon, I suppose I really am a big girl now.

Walking Backwards

I think it might at last be time for me to turn introspective and consider this year. After all, I start my new job Monday -- which I can't believe -- and I should finish my blogging about my volunteer time first. Here is my list of Things I've Learned. They fall into two groups : the Hows and the Whats.

Things I've Learned in My Year of Volunteer Service:

1) How to jump a car (though I probably won't remember)

2) How to get rid of flies

3) That Panera started in St. Louis

4) How to parallel park

5) How to pay in cash for gasoline

6) That a GSP is not necessary

7) That Wednesday mornings are perfect for lattes.

8) That I don't know myself as well as I thought I did

9) How to be friends with people who are not nerds

10) That a Beth-sized person can fit into a laundry chute

11) That poverty is complex

12) How to bite my tongue

13) How to speak with compassion

14) How to placate rich donors

15) That dignity and pride are different

16) How to make and sell dog bones

17) How to make clam chowder

18) That white-girl hair fascinates black girls

19) How to be more observant

20) That I don't matter -- or that I do

Thursday Next Series, Jasper Fforde

More of an Idiot: Thursday Next Series, Jasper Fforde: "I decided to wait and post about this series in one entry. Fforde wrote four books about his 'literary detective' heroine, Thursday Next: The Eyre Affair, Lost in a Good Book, The Well of Lost Plots, and Something Rotten. They are set in England in a world that might-have-been, if Winston Churchill had not carried England through the Second World War.

Thursday, a Special Operations agent of the Literary Detectives, spends most of her days searching out forged Miltons and keeping Marlovites (those who think Marlowe penned Shakespeare's plays) from rioting. Then an operative from a high unit of Special Operations comes to seek her help. Acheron Hades, the archnemesis of the world as his name might imply, is plotting evil things, and Thursday can recognize him since he once was her professor. As events unroll, Hades and Thursday discover a way to travel into books, a feat Hades uses to blackmail the world when he threatens harm to Jane Eyre and Thursday uses to pursue Hades.

And that's just the first book. In subsequent books, Thursday battles more of the Hades clan (their names are Cocytus, Phlegethon, Lethe, Styx, and Aornis) and goes head-to-head with her country's personal evil corporation. She ends up living inside Book World, a complex fictional society where characters live and new stories are created. Ultimately, she has to save the real world from threats of its own and characters from the Book World.

Fforde creates an alternate England that provides a hilarious, witty, and sometimes scathing critique of the modern world. He throws in time travel, re-engineered extinct species, and full contact croquet just for the fun of it, and his novels are fun. However, I found his long sojourn to Book World very tedious. He creates a detailed set of rules and mores for his fictional world that fall flat after reading the parts that take place in the modern world. They tested the bounds of belief and were not always internally consistent. And, frankly, I ultimately did not care about the complexities of Book World. I wanted Next to get on with her life in the real world.

Still, I think this series (or at least the first one) is a must-read for any English nerd. How can you turn down a novel with Shakespeare vending machines?"

I Am Elsewhere

I am now online elsewhere : the Catholics on Call blog! It feels almost like being published!

Check it out here!

Summer School, Take II

Somehow, during my tenure as a self-employed bum, I agreed to moonlight as a substitute teacher. Both Benjamin and my college roommate, Wendy, work this summer for what Benjamin described as a "Korean academic boot camp," and I let him talk me into subbing. After all, coming on the heels of an inner city middle school, how bad could 5-9 Korean children be?

The answer was, much as I suspected, not very. I found myself more concerned about whether they were learning and I was following correct instructional procedure than whether they were going to kill each other or start a riot. That's not how it usually goes. I handed them packets of work, and they proceeded to complete the packets, without question or comment. What?

On the other hand, they presented, even in three hours, some new challenges. At least 4 of my 7 fifth grade readers knew Korean better than English and spoke in Korean. I like to be able to understand what students are saying; especially with a culture whose expressions are stoic compared to much of America, understanding words helps me take the emotional pulse of a classroom. Also, it made for an interesting dynamic, because the English speakers and the Korean speakers had very different ways of processing vocabulary words. Just like with my children this past year, they lacked a good deal of the cultural literacy that informed the packets, but unlike with my former students, I didn't know their frame of reference well enough to help them contextualize their new ideas.

After 2 hours with fifth graders, I had a group of five third graders. Besides being adorable, they were smart and enjoyed doing the work. One of them had a hard time remembering my name and told me that she remembered Korean names better. I told her I understood -- I had a hard time remembering Korean names.

Finally, as I stopped to chat with Benjamin on the way out, we had the moment of truth. I'm used to being one of the few white people at a school and watching students process this fact. Here I came across the greatest difference between my Korean students and my African American students. No one asked if he was my brother or cousin. They asked if I was his girlfriend.

My Weakness

In case you are wondering, I am now at home. My time here is spent with family and friends, cooking, and sorting through the boxes that I shoved in the basement when I moved home from college and promptly forgot. Now that I am moving once more, I want to make sure I know the difference between the things I need with me, the things I want with me, the things I want to keep but not move, and the things I can give or throw away.

In my boxes, I have discovered one of the things I gave up as a part of simple living : the books I own. I only let myself bring a few books to St. Louis with me (I think 3) and now I am unearthing the beginnings of a fantastic library. English majors end up with good books, such as Austen, James, Shakespeare, Bronte (both), Faulkner, Frost, Plath, and anthologies ad nauseum. Sociology majors acquire more non-fiction, but I found familiar names such as Peggy Levitt and Leo Chavez. And then there are the old friends that I have met on my own -- Robin McKinley, C.S. Lewis, Harper Lee, Madeline L'Engle, Sandra Cisneros, Catullus, Emily Dickinson -- plus a thesaurus, a name dictionary, the Catechism, a Spanish dictionary...

I have too many books to bring with me every time I move, but they make me really look forward to a day when I am settled somewhere. I want a Beauty and the Beast -esque library with books from floor to ceiling, and it looks like I have a pretty good start. However, now that I am not in a community dedicated to simply living and a place where I will have to fly or ship books home, I find self-control harder. I have a hunch I am going to bring way too many books with me to my next stage of life.

Round-Trip

My parents arrived in St. Louis on Monday and we've done a whirlwind tour of the important sites: Anheuser-Busch, the Arch, the Cathedral Basilica, the Butterfly House... Underlying it all was the knowledge that when they leave St. Louis on Thursday, so do I.

Tomorrow morning, I fly out of Lambert-St. Louis International Airport on a little plane bound for DC. In the coming days, I'll post some concluding musings about my time here : what I've learned, how I've changed, etc. This post is more to update my loyal readers who read for the sake of knowing where I am and what I'm doing. I'm leaving my community and family here and heading home for a couple weeks.