Black and White: Part Two

Today felt sideways. I woke up feeling like I hadn’t slept (and that’s nothing new, and it’s not anything untrue, but it’s the mindset I rose from: that someplace I was going to, on the edge of the horizon, still a blur but something, and I didn’t know where I was going, and I didn’t know how far until I got there–dreamstate, waking, that’s where I was). I got dressed. Left on time. Got to class.

For the first time all semester, programming didn’t come easily. And though I got my unicorns to whinny-whinny and NEIGH, how I got there was like a bridge I’d forgotten I’d crossed over. I could see the code, could emulate and imitate and remarkably recreate, but I could not just create. I could not start from scratch and get there. A piece was missing.

After class, I wanted to speak with my superior for a few moments, felt obligated to help clean up before I got anywhere else, but knew I needed something else. So I went where I had never gone before, a place I had only ever seen from the edge. My secret place.

Black and White: Part One

In a moment I was called a bureaucrat and a dictator. I was told I’ve spent so much time up top I’ve forgotten how the people at the bottom still think. How they feel. How they live and die and prosper and are crushed, decimated, dessicated, turned to poison and ingested in the cannibalistic universe we live in. All these things in fewer words, but all these things nonetheless.

The truth is I haven’t forgotten. My hide has grown thicker. My skin has grown harder. My muscles, stronger; my bones, impassioned, have turned to steel. And my mind–that precious vestibule of unarticulated prowess–my mind has only sharpened as in these days of misery I live life. But I have not forgotten.

People don’t know me. Even when I see a man a hundred times a day, even when I share my deepest thoughts and my most hidden inclinations and my most obvious and embarrassing faults with him, he does not know me. Maybe I don’t speak as clearly as I think I speak. Or maybe, as is more probable, I’m simply deeper than I think I’m deep.

Imaginary Teammates

Tomorrow begins NaNoWriMo and this is an exceptional year for me: Not only is it my sixth consecutive year competing, it’s also my third and my last year as Municipal Liaison (or regional coordinator) of the North Carolina Triad region (formerly the Greensboro region). I have so many exciting things I want to get done, and one of them is continuing to build upon our sense of community. I know I’ll be leaving next year for Raleigh to finish my bachelor’s degree at NC State, but I want to leave our region thriving and strong.

One way I hope to accomplish this is through encouraging my fellow Wrimos to embrace their own inner potential–and my intent is to do this while teaching them how to unlock their characters’ hidden potential. This all sounds bright and lovely, and if I can tangibly create what I envision in my mind, this is going to be an incredible and stupendous year for our region and our writers.

Luckily for me, this year follows a lot of leadership development on my part, and although it’s hard to imagine how leadership training coincides with stronger writing, once the connection is clear, it’s an amazing revelation. See, leadership is all about interaction and direction–and what’s a story but a collection of character interaction and plot direction? A good character is a good leader, or if not, can be properly distinguished from one–and when the author can tell the difference, the possibilities expand exponentially and even endlessly.

This then is merely the first of hopefully many lessons, a short piece expanded upon from a recent email I sent out to my region. Nonetheless, the advice is worthwhile for any writer or any leader, and I hope no matter which you are, or even if you’re neither, you can find some worth in the words that follow.

Obvious Facts and Obscure Facets

If I say I’m going to break the trend by not including an introduction, but this very statement precedes the teaching and therefore carries the trend along, is the trend still kept or broken? No matter, just some musings, carry on.

2.6 This was another teaching of his:

A boor cannot be reverent;
An ignoramus cannot be pious;
A shy person cannot learn;
An ill-tempered person cannot teach;
Not everyone engrossed in business learns wisdom;
Where there are no worthy persons, strive to be a worthy person.

Hillel fascinates me. His attention to detail, his slightly skewed lessons that take some genuine thought to come together, his peculiar yet poetic way of phrasing things. If I should ever be a rabbi, I should like to be one like him. I suppose even if I never am a rabbi, I still will be a writer and a teacher, and these qualities of his I most invest my admiration in can still be mine someday. No matter, just some musings, carry on.

As you read this, should you be reading this around the time WordPress mechanically posts it as programmed (for, you see, the magic of the internet allows me to write this on Wednesday and post it on Saturday), I will be in a van destined for Jackson, Mississippi, for the ISJL Annual Education Conference. The ISJL, more verbosely known as the Institute of Southern Jewish Learning, provides my synagogue’s congregational school with our curriculum and most of the teachers are going. Obviously, I will be among them, but I mention this otherwise invisible temporal deception for one key point: That three of the six lines (that’s a whopping fifty-percent!) of this teaching concern, well, teaching. I find it ironically appropriate. The perfect lesson to learn before attending the conference.

I’m stoked.

If Students Be the Food of Life, Lead On

Two down and one to go. My in-depth analysis of my college grading rubric is coming to a written close, and yet is still just blossoming into something more tangible and usable than written thoughts alone.

On Wednesday I discussed the features of a college’s basic profile–their location, their expenses, school colors, and a few other points. Yesterday I spoke about academics, math and Judaica, foreign languages and politics, as well as some things like student/faculty ratios and accelerated programs, and I got some great feedback, too.

Today, I’m talking about life. Student life in particular.

To Speak the Public Protest

There’s a trick I’ve picked up that’s gotten me out of a few sticky situations. I’ve had a lot of leadership training, some media prep, and probably more math drills than most humans can suffice to think of let alone subject themselves to, but this trick, it’s none of the above. It’s a touch of psychology, an ounce or so of mythology, a few dashes of dreaming, and a whole lot of deceit.

But it’s not really deceit when you think about it. After all, what is the world past what we make of it? “If you build it, they will come.” If you make it, it’s yours to own. And when you own the world, there’s nothing you can’t do.

So where’s the lease, you ask? Right at your fingertips if you open your hand and reach for it.

G is for Gophers

G is also for gays, great, goodness, good-will, and God, but as we all probably know, all of those are–can you guess it?–givens. (Did you see what I did there?) I could easily speak of all of these, and I’ve especially already spoken of the first and perhaps the second and third as well, and good-will is easily covered and God is a topic always burning with new ground to cover (better question: did you see what I did there?), but today, I’d rather speak of something more important and more pertinent than any one of those: Gophers.

A bit of background is in order, and the beginning of background comes in the form of frogs, which is not a g-word unless there’s only one and it’s hopping backward, at which point you can call it a gorf. In any case, I happily admit that I knit, and in the knitting community, the technical term for unraveling a knitted piece of fabric is called “frogging,” because you “rip it, rip it.” (True story: That incredibly punny pun is not of my own crafting, no pun intended.)

There’s a few other animals that also need some mentioning here: There’s wolves when we choke down dinner, there’s bears when we have things to carry, and there’s always donkeys when we do thing half-assed (don’t disagree with me, I’m positive that’s where the term comes from, and since the human body is electrically neutral, you can be sure that that means I’m certain).

We deal with many other animals on a daily basis as well, although unfortunately we don’t usually wish to remember them: We all have a sad tendency of being involved with too many pigs, snakes, and female dogs, don’t we, even when we wish to leave the petting zoo and come home at last, not to mention the occasional chicken, rat, or cougar that we cross paths with. It happens. We’re only human.

But there’s one more animal often neglected, and it’s this animal that I’ll be speaking of today.

F is for Fearless

Call me arrogant. Call me blind. Call me careless, defiant, or egregious. But don’t call me stupid. Don’t call me unprepared. And definitely don’t call me out on coming out.

Fight the World

Maybe I’m a writer and it’s just how we think. Maybe I’m a minority and it’s how we survive. Or maybe it’s the weather and just how we stay alive. But whatever the reason, whatever the cause, I feel like fighting.

It might seem an odd expression for me to say, so normally fond of peace as I am, but sometimes it takes a fighting soul to shove others into action. Sometimes we call this violence or aggression. But sometimes we call it passion and–

18. Ambition

Friendly Fire (Keeps Me Burning Brighter)

There are so many things to be thankful for! I have been so busy this week, working with college administration to approve plans for the GSA and studying for midterms and tests and quizzes all while trying to keep up with homework! I’m not sure how I’ve managed to make it so far this week without going insane or losing it, but somehow I’ve done it.

I think the biggest thing I’m thankful right now are the ones that have made all of this bearable:

16: Friends