Entries from May 2005 ↓

Hello Readers–

I will be writing soon about blogs and education, in a few days when I have time to dig up some relevant links.

In the meantime, The NY Times has a new 4-part series on class. Those without accounts can use Bugmenot to avoid those pesky logins.

Check out the interactive chart which tells you where you stand class-wise in regards to four factors: occupation, education, income, and wealth.

Two very interesting quotes:

1. “One surprising finding about mobility is that it is not higher in the United States than in Britain or France. It is lower here than in Canada and some Scandinavian countries but not as low as in developing countries like Brazil, where escape from poverty is so difficult that the lower class is all but frozen in place.

“Those comparisons may seem hard to believe. Britain and France had hereditary nobilities; Britain still has a queen. The founding document of the United States proclaims all men to be created equal. The American economy has also grown more quickly than Europe’s in recent decades, leaving an impression of boundless opportunity.”

This puts to bed many Americans’ cliched notion of the US as “the country where anyone can be President.” And,

2. “Being born in the elite in the U.S. gives you a constellation of privileges that very few people in the world have ever experienced,” Professor Levine said. “Being born poor in the U.S. gives you disadvantages unlike anything in Western Europe and Japan and Canada.”

I knew my instinct to move to Canada or Sweden was a good one.

I was on the platform waiting for a 5 train at Grand Central on Saturday: going to the last of a series of workshops that I was co-teaching on blogging for teachers.

A young-forty-something blond woman was with (presumably) her early-twenty-something daughters. I jumped to this conclusion since they all had identical big-but-straight blonde hair, really light and bright. And mom had blue mascara and eye shadow up the wazoo. Unlike the hair, the blue mascara and eye shadow did not seem to be genetic. (Perhaps the father had a gene for a more neutral palette of eye make-up?)

You see a lot of these family groups: kid who seems to live in New York with wide-eyed, loud-talkin’ parents from somewhere much less busy. What follows is a loosely-remembered conversation:

Mom (Holding up a gold-colored coin): Is this good here?
Daughter: What do you mean?
Mom: This coin. Can you use it here?
Daughter: Um, that’s a dollar! That’s a dollar coin!
Mom: Oh–
Daughter: That’s a U.S. dollar!
Mom: Oh?
Daughter: They came out with that a while ago.
Mom: Oh!
Daughter (Laughing, good-naturedly): Where do you think you are, anyway?

Poor Mom. She’s not the first person to have thought NYC was another country. Thing is, if it’s one other country, it’s 100 other countries. For example, today I took a wee detour on a work errand, and stopped off at Flushing Main Street.

As I used to say to my dad, before I ever set foot in Flushing, “Flushing: it’s not just a neighborhood in Queens, it’s a toilet verb.” Fortunately, I haven’t thought twice about the unfortunate name since I first visited.

It is a strange name, though, isn’t it?

And I was reminded of how Flushing can be, like the Midnight Mailman show, “for fun and learning.” It’s the meeting of worlds. On the one hand, it’s home to the oldest Quaker meeting in NYC (which also held the public school and first racially integrated school in NYC: they were one and the same), but also to the most recent immigrants from many parts of Asia. And from lots of other places too. Many stores, cafes and bars, have signs in Korean or Chines or Japanese, with no translation. And I have a hunch that you can buy just about anything East Asian here. (The traditional NYC Chinatown thrives in lower Manhattan, but Flushing is buzzing with activity.)

I went into one all-kinds-of-Asian-stuff store, and bought 3 fragrant soaps for $1 (one jasmine, two sandalwood. I do loves me some sandalwood, but no-one can say I don’t try something new when the opportunity presents itself.) They had jar upon jar of medicinals and edibles, including lots of things I could not identify (though assumed they were either medicinal or edible or both), and others I could. I was very tempted by black rice. But not the dried seahorses.

I went to another shop and got some cheap fruit, and I got my train.

And here I am, oddly enough, blogging in public for the first time: at a new wireless-equipped teashop in my own ‘hood. It’s a lovely day in Long Island City. And though there’s nary a dried seahorse to be had, we still love our neighborhood.

A ruggedly ragged and weathered-looking fellow outside the open window was just carrying on an animated conversation with an invisible someone who must truly be very small indeed, since the man was sitting on an 8-inch concrete ledge, slouching, and looking way way down, as he spoke softly and gesticulated in an animated fashion.

Their conversation presumably ended, the man came through the open window (I should say, to his credit, the window was actually a full-length window, and the most relatively together of patrons might have to think for a moment before deciding instead to use the proper door, also provided). He came in, wandered around, bought a coffee, and was off, for now.

I was going to write a post about writer’s block. But I realized I have both writer’s and reader’s blocks. Basically, no trouble filling my day reading something. But I have been getting nothing done as far as reading or writing for my dissertation. Nor have I been keeping up with your blogs. (Sometimes I have lurked, but I haven’t commented. You know who you are.) And I have missed it.

And although usually in the past I’ve found that writing a nice wee blog entry gets the old gears working, and serves as a warm-up for the writing I’m supposed to be doing, somehow, the last few weeks, I haven’t written anything at all.

I have cast out a few nets for dissertation fellowships, and am waiting to see if any of them come in. The hopes are slim. As the time to finding out about them approaches, I have been mega-stressed-out to the point of intellectual paralysis (thank you, Mr. James Joyce) by the process of waiting to see if I will have a fellowship or a new job for next year. (My current job ends in August.) This is not to excuse what is, at the end of the day, procrastination. But I am trying to figure out its cause, and I think I’ve got it.

I don’t like waiting. This happens on a day-to-day basis: if I have something to do later in the day, something exciting (whether it’s teaching a new workshop, or hosting a public event), it’s really hard for me to focus on doing anything substantial in the meantime (rote, mindless work is just fine, but nothing involving the whole brain). It’s as if my adrenaline stores are already gearing up for later, and I’m caffeinated before I even walk towards the espresso machine.

I have noticed this for some time.

But I had not recognized the fact that this inability to focus in the face of an upcoming event–in this case, news of my future financial status–can occur over a period of weeks or months.

It’s darned frustrating.

As an aside, I had a wonderful dream a few weeks back (before a trip to the dentist), in which a dentist did all of my tooth x-rays, then showed me the curve of my teeth along the jaw, and pronounced me as having ADD, based on this. In the dream, I said, “Ahh, that makes total sense.” Of course, I have never been diagnosed with ADD. But I liked the idea that dentists could see something of your personality through their bite-wings. And, coward as I am, I preferred being told I had ADD to being told I needed dental-work.

My few regular readers have probably thought I’ve lost my marbles: first software reviews, and now self-analysis. What next?

I note that I won’t be apologizing, dear readers, for the slackiness of my posting, and then–when I do post–the non-blogginess of it all (I resisted posting two more NYT articles today.) I know I am letting you down, but I am nonetheless eschewing the self-inflicted guilt-trip. Though I did begin an apology, before deleting it.

Apparently you have to take what you can get. Call it a potluck of a blog. (Oh, we Quakers, we love our potlucks.) Bear with me! And if any of you has any part-time jobs on offer starting in about September, let me know. I only get writer’s block with my own work…