Cold Spaghetti

Baby Bite Art.

Kate’s attempts at apple-eating.

Is it Art: playing with the positive and negative space of ordinary objects, testing our comfort with smooth edges and defined space?  Or, a Political Statement: exploring waste and the ease with which we throw away perfectly good, nutritional, and wholesome parts that sit right in front of us?

The Artist’s Collection of Bite Art currently includes 2 apples and 1 pear (not photographed).  The banana did not last.

About 10 years ago, my cousin Ellen found this little dog, named her Honey, and took her home to love forever.  Like she has many times before, Honey obediently traveled to Pennsylvania while her Mommy got married.  But unlike past trips, this one meant facing Kate.  For four days straight.

Kate was head-over-heals in love with Honey from the moment she saw her.  Every few minutes, one of us would have to restrain Kate to give Honey enough of a head start to hide from her admirer.

Even from the car, Kate let her intent of being with Honey be known.  Kate quickly recognized the winding road to my Uncle’s house (a charming drive that includes passage on a one-lane bridge) — and from a 1/2 mile range of my Uncle’s house would begin to call HOOOONNNNNNEYYYYYY!!!!!! loud enough to blast the eardrums of anyone else sitting in the car.

The anticipation of seeing Honey! was too much for Kate to hold in.

Kate loved Honey SO MUCH that she even shared her blanket.  She doesn’t even let Elmo share her blanket.

1. The only person who cares about my dissertation is me.

2. The only person who will read all of my dissertation is me.

3. The only person who the dissertation will have any impact on is me.

4. The only good dissertation is a FINISHED dissertation.

5. I would do well to keep all of the above in mind and just find something to wrap this thing up.

Despite Kate’s foray into the realm of “THAT KID” on Thursday’s flight, we arrived in Pennsylvania to perfect fall weather (73 degrees with 50% humidity?!) and have been having a busy, fun time since.  TODAY, Ellen and Blake got married.  I officiated and photographed.  (Paul took photos during the ceremony.)

Here are a few random ones I pulled while the cards downloaded.  Just so that I can show my face at lunch tomorrow and tell my family members that, yes, in fact, there really was something happening in that camera I kept torturing them with.

Have I mentioned how beautiful central Pennsylvania is?  Uncanny.

Kate also had her wedding debut.

More pictures when we get back Monday!

Just in case my words weren’t convincing, take a look at the women who know her best.  This little conceived ‘over coffee’ rally drew a state record for turnout.

Aye, Nietzsche.  What other choice do we have?

Finally, I heard back from Tulane’s health insurance system… in a mass email, but hey, at least it was something.  What before was “I don’t think you qualify, but I need to check,” is actually I *DO* qualify to enroll in the Tulane plan even though I am considered a ‘part-time’ dissertation student without course credits.  In fact, I can enroll all four of us on the plan… AND even get dental.  The price?  About $12,000 annually, (only $10,200 without dental.)  Plus 20% for Every Damn Thing, a $750 deductible to meet, and a low lifetime maximum (don’t get hit by a bus)!

While this is still cheaper than the $1800/month COBRA option, it’s still pretty high.  But it buys us some time to find out what will happen in a year.

Another option we’re trying to explore: getting the Tulane insurance (which is, all in all, a pretty crappy,  expensive plan but maybe better than nothing?) for just me and seeing if Blue Cross Blue Shield will insure just Paul and the kids.  BCBS has not been happy with my paperwork thus far, since I know have ‘ulcerative colitis’ on my ‘history’ but have had no treatment for this diagnosis for almost 7 years.  I tracked down my old doctor from Michigan (now in Irvine, California) who called me at 11:55pm local time last Thursday.  That’s how hard insurance companies make doctors work… that they are at the office at 10pm calling patients a few time zones away.  *sigh*

We had a great conversation despite the late time and she relayed to me a dozen insurance horror stories which included things like a triathlete who happened to have a sinus infection the year before applying for coverage and was offered a policy which included a waiver that anything related to sinus infection would not be covered for 6 years.  And one about a patient who was treated for a cold and mentioned having some diarrhea at the time of treatment — he was denied health insurance and although Dr. Song wrote several letters attesting to the man’s health and the fact that diarrhea is just a normal part of having a cold, the policy was refused.  In other words, she was pretty convinced that because of my colitis history… even though she agrees it was very likely self-limiting (meaning I’ll probably never have any issues again)… that I will never be able to get insurance.

So the game continues.

Our children are good at many things.  But going to sleep at night is not one of them.

Well, maybe that isn’t quite true.  Somewhere around age 2, Will became an award-winning, champion sleeper.  Even now, he’s still pretty good about going to bed when told.  Yeah, he politics and rationalizes all the reasons why he shouldn’t go to bed, but when we are firm he typically listens.  This is particularly when Kate isn’t around.

Kate does not like to sleep.  In truth, she’s never liked to sleep.  When she was a baby, I would lay nursing  her on our bed with a leg thrown over her legs and an arms thrown over her body — holding her down as delicately as we could — until she stopped moving long enough to nurse and fall asleep.  This is when she was 4 months old.  It’s only gotten worse since then.

Looking back at some of the milestone posts I wrote about Kate, each one I’ve found says something about her inability to get to sleep and stay asleep.

At some point this past summer, Paul and I took on the near-death experience of teaching Kate to go to bed.  We used this Supernanny-inspired hint of wisdom with Will and found it to be a stroke of genius, without the psychologically damaging side effects of other methods.  The idea is you stay in the room and each time the child gets out of bed, you put them back in.  The trick is that you must do this, without stopping, for about 5 hours.  You don’t eat, sleep, talk, use the bathroom, and after awhile, you don’t even think… you just desperately wish for someone to remove you from your misery.

Somewhere in the second week, we found that Kate was able to actually go to sleep after our bedtime routine.  Granted, she wakes up a few hours into her sleep each night with night terrors — but as this has been a constant in our lives for nearly a year, we were okay with it.  I do plan on asking her pediatrician about it when we can figure out how to actually see a doctor again… best guesses on this timeline is when I have enough time to wait outside the free children’s health van for the uninsured.  It’ll take all day for the 10 minute consult, but that’s okay; it will give me plenty of time to think of some really good fake names.

Regardless of how many times she woke up, we were completely blissed out over having successfully conquered a Bedtime Routine that lasted under 2 hours.

We must have been high on life, because we quickly destroyed it all by going on vacation.  And then spending a week in Mobile, evacuated from our home due to Gustav.  We kissed all that hard-earned work right out the window.

And now, even though we know what is Right and what is Wrong, and even though we really know what we have to do next… what we really want to do is whip them both soundly and send them to bed.

I love this eloquent post about the multiple tragedies of 9-11.

I recently read Three Cups of Tea, the story of Greg Mortenson and his years of working in remote Pakistan and Afghanistan, building schools for some of the most impoverished children in the world.  As a professional in the field of health and development, I was struck by the innocence with which Mr. Mortenson approached the monumental challenges inherent in this field with little support and no training; naively equipped with only respect and kindness in his heart.  Part of the importance of the book is that it clearly demonstrates how the impoverished are easy targets for extremists, who offer free education, housing, and meals to people faced with no other life-sustaining options.  In the area of the world forgotten by American aid and blanketed with US bombs, Greg Mortenson helps communities build schools and provides possibly the only light of American kindness seen by these people.  The book passionately describes the beauty of the land, the people, and the compassion within of each community.  It gives example after example of how, no matter the differences in our cultures or religions, we all want the same opportunities and happiness for our loved ones.

In that spirit, I encourage anyone who wants to honor the anniversary of 9-11 to visit the Central Asia Institute’s website, read about how their programs fight terrorism in it’s root causes, and make a tax deductible donation to this wonderful nonprofit.

UPDATE: This post was named a JUST POST for September 2008.  (Thank you, Alejna!)

By the fourth semester of teaching the same college-level Women’s Health course, there were few surprises. But then, in that last term, during the session on reproductive health, our faculty lecturer asked the crowd a question she’d asked every class: “what is the most common form of birth control?”

Usually there would be murmurs of ‘condoms’ ‘IUDs’ and ‘birth control pills’ from the crowd. In three terms, we’d never heard anyone give the correct answer (sterilization). But that last semester, we were all shocked when the crowd of 300 students filled the lecture hall with a single answer: “ABSTINENCE!”

Holy crap. The other GSIs, the lecturer, and I all exchanged surprised and frightened looks. We realized in that moment that the generation deprived of sex education was hitting college-age and the impact of just what that meant had a chilling potential. (Coincidentally, this was also the term when one of my freshman students came to office hours after the anatomy and physiology lecture and shyly asked, “So, women have, like, three holes, right?”)

Maybe those experiences were my hint that American people are really, incredibly, and undeniably in the dark. That our nearly 30 years of conservative governance chipping away at the building blocks for solid, healthy lives and quality education have grown a populace too under-educated, too tired, and too sick to make good choices. This is my only answer for why anyone in their right mind could think Sarah Palin is a good choice for Vice President of our country.

I do not want to give the Governor a hard time because I honestly feel badly for her.  She was thrust out of her small town responsibilities and into an arena she is no where near being experienced, educated, or informed enough to handle.  She is not there because of any political credentials or successes.  The McCain campaign, by choosing her, exposed their own prejudices and misogyny inherent in the radical right agenda; they did not look within their party to the successful, experienced women who are known to be among the more moderate on their side of isle (Olympia Snowe? Kay Bailey Hutchinson?)  Instead, they are giving us what we voted in 8 years ago… an unknown, religious fundamentalist, junior legislator with little experience and completely unprepared for the office of President.   They chose a woman directly to speak to Clinton supporters, yet with none of the qualities Hilary brought to her candidacy. (And speaking of Clinton, whoa, Palin seriously owes her some major props for more than a year of tough campaigning and door opening, without which the Palin nomination would never have been possible.)

All I can think of when I see Palin and hear the school-boy love gushing by those conservative dough–boys is how the McCain camp picked the only kind of woman they can support: one that they can fantasize about. Whether it is the sexy-librarian, the hot-for-teacher, or the superior officer fetish (you remember that one, Jack Nicholson relays it in ‘A Few Good Men’ – line about half way through the clip), Palin brings that sex appeal to the race.  Guys and girls alike have no problem dismissing the ugly girl. But when a pretty girl comes along and asks for something, guys have a hard time not obeying her every word. And girls, well, we can sometimes have a hard time not following that same siren call; we were indoctrinated through years of watching 90210.

Steinem called her “Phyllis Schlafly, only younger”.  I think she’s worse.  She fills the conservative analysts’ favorite seat, the one that was Paglia’s and then Coulter’s, that of the anti-feminist feminist.  With Palin, McCain’s camp can twist feminism as a buzz word, invoking all sorts of archetypal favorites: The Mother, The Tough Cookie, The Small-town Hero, and make theirs a campaign about butterflies and rainbows and sit-by-the-fire family stories.  Anything to avoid attention on what the campaign should be about: issues.

Please, my fellow country men and women, please please please help me believe that we, as a nation, are smarter than this.  That we will not put another fundamentalist into office.  That the next executive branch will not include a creationist who denies global warming and encourages the burning of more fossil fuels.  I need to believe that we are better than this, that we can elect leaders who stand out and represent the best of what this great nation has to give.

UPDATE: This post was named a JUST POST for September 2008.  (Thank you, Alejna!)