The Hyphen House

I have always loved the first day of school. Even as a home-schooler my parents made a big deal about it, with new clothes and books and lots of build up. In college, I looked forward to new classes and challenges each semester. And now as a teacher, I still get butterflies and can hardly sleep the night before.

I guess that means I'm in the right profession! Last year when I was just writing, I found it hard to have any sort of rhythm. I also felt like I wasn't contributing to the world like I wanted to. It's hard to let your gifts lie dormant. I don't regret taking last year off from teaching, but I did miss it terribly.

And I'm glad to be teaching my one class this semester. I feel a little rusty, and in the past I've definitely over-prepared, while now I'm quite under-prepared. Oh well, here we go.

I've been mulling over these thoughts for a while now, and decided to be the two millionth or so person to analyze the complexities of micro-blogging. I've never gotten into Twitter, and I've only been on a Twitter website a few times, but Facebook status updates are a constant barrage of bits of information about people's lives for me.

Writing a dissertation means I'm on the computer and internet all the time, and when the writing is not going well I'm on Facebook pretty constantly. Dissertating is a lonely process, and hitting refresh on FB to bring me news of friends and acquaintances somehow makes it feel less lonely. I'm always thrilled to hear about someone I hardly ever see or talk to getting engaged, a new job, etc. It's nice to be in on the random details of someone's day, too, the inconsequential things that seem important enough to tell the world about. Even with friends I see or talk to often, I have key points to address when we next talk, like "I saw on FB that you went to that new restaurant" or "Oh you saw that movie, what did you think?" My personal status updates come when I'm feeling particularly interesting, or I've done something cool, or I'm feeling thankful. And telling my 400 odd FB friends about me somehow validates my actions or thoughts.

So here's why I hate it. It feels dishonest in some ways. For example, yesterday I posted an update about the organic apple/kiwi juice I made fresh. Impressive, right? But I posted nothing about the gross fast food I ate for lunch, or how I'd skipped breakfast because I didn't feel well, etc. Even if it's about something as banal as food, you will never get the full story. Updates or tweets are carefully chosen selections. I may be having a really terrible day but post something about how much I love summer. Both may be true at the same time, but the crappy day is more encompassing and you'd have no way of knowing that. The point is it shows some of what we are doing but not how we are doing.

And sometimes, I have this crazy jealousy for other people's days. Based on their statuses, their life seems way more interesting than mine today. Sometimes I get my feelings hurt because I see that someone did something cool but didn't invite me or a close friend posts news I wish I'd heard in person (I know more than one person who has learned of their sibling's engagement via Facebook). Seems silly, but an instance like that could affect me deeply for a while.

In Laurel Snyder's article "Addicted to Twitter" she talks about how she thinks in Twitter when she's not around it. I find myself doing this too. When we were abroad this summer I did not miss my cell phone one bit, and barely missed the internet, but I still found myself thinking after many experience, "Lauran just saw a lake where scenes from Harry Potter were filmed" or "Lauran is trying out an English accent." What? That's what I'm thinking about? How I can sound the coolest on Facebook? Like it's a twisted popularity contest I'm playing with myself?

Snyder brilliantly puts it this way:
"It’s all the mental and creative energy spent on words that don’t even get archived. It’s all the tweets that could have been conversations with my family. All the words I could have poured into poems or lines of dialogue or essays like this one. All the thoughts that should not be formatted, reduced, condensed to 140 characters. All the ideas meant for mulling. All the words best spoken to an audience of one (or none). It’s the idea that thinking is not a performance, hard as that can be for someone like me to accept."

I'm not quitting micro-blogging or taking a fast from it or whatever, I'm just trying to be aware of what effect it has on me and to temper it as much as possible. My life is way too complex for 140 characters.

And just for fun, here's a spoof of Twitter called "Flutter":

Lauran and I went to see (500) Days of Summer a few nights ago. I will try not to spoil it for those who haven't seen it, but I must say that I found it to be very entertaining and revealing. It gave me a lot to think about because I could relate to so much of it. It felt very real.

The male character, Tom, is overly idealistic. I say he suffers from "Prufrock syndrome," something I to tend to suffer from. I get the name from T.S. Eliot's poem (the most amazing poem in the English language by the way). The poem is essentially about a man who experiences life from a distance, who is so trapped in his ideals, that he is paralyzed. I tend to fall victim to my own overblown idealism, romanticism, and optimism, so I can relate a little too much to this character. In fact, it was on rereading this poem for the umpteenth time that I decided finally to ask Lauran out because I didn't want to "grow old" and "wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled." Tom has some of the same problems. He is an architect who works at a greeting card company because this job conveniently allows him to protect himself from the possible disappointment of not being able to succeed at his dream. It allows him to live in the trite world of get-well-soons and i-love-yous and happy-birthdays rather than face the possibility that reality might not coincide with his ideals.

Tom meets Summer and falls for her instantly. Summer, however, wants to keep things casual. She is skeptical about love and guarded about her feelings. Tom only thinks he is guarded about his feelings. He only sees roses and singing birds. I can relate all too well to this way of seeing the world. I am an incurable optimist and romantic. I don't apologize for it or even think it is a bad way of going about life. I like being an optimist and romantic, but it does have its pitfalls. I have a tendency to avoid conflict. I sometimes am oblivious to people's pain and anger. I withdraw from those who don't affirm my ideals.

Fortunately, Tom is not a static character. I won't give away the ending, but it was refreshing to see how he and Summer grew. Real growth is not something you see in most romantic comedies (and I admit that I tend to like romantic comedies and am glad to be married so that I can have an excuse to watch them without breaking any guy codes). Fortunately, I have also grown (with my fair share of regressing and relapsing of course). The beginning stages of Tom and Summer's relationship reminded me in many ways of the beginning of my relationship with Lauran. I fell much quicker than she did. I avoided conflict and was often confused when she showed hurt or anger. I idealized her.

One day reality set in, and I was like Prufrock swimming with the mermaids when "human voices wake us and we drown." Our first real conflict made me feel as though my world was crashing down around me, but it wasn't. Rather, the reality of our love (with all its imperfections) crashed through my illusions. I think the reason this movie has resonated with so many in my generation is that many of us tend to be either Summer or Tom, either disillusioned cynics, or hopeless romantics. Sadly, both of these things lead us to a love paralysis (a la Prufrock). Love is not some perfect ideal, nor is it some sugary delusion. Yet we often think it is. We rush in like idiots, get hurt, and then build up our defenses. Our illusions get shattered, so we abandon all our ideals and hopes.

I thank God for Lauran and for the opportunity to know real love, not pop song love, not fairy tale love, not romatic comedy love. As we watched the movie together, I laughed some (ok I laughed a lot, you know I never laugh just a little), and I winced a little as I watched this couple navigate the treacherous waters of love armed only with romanticism and skepticism, our 21st century weapons that are really so useless in the face of love's storms. Afterwards, I had a greater appreciation for the journey love has taken us on and for the way we have both grown. There is still hope for us romantics and for you skeptics.

Eric and I saw Julie and Julia tonight, which is a delightful film that I actually found really inspiring. I love that Julia Child didn't discover her passion in cooking until her 40s, and worked on her book for over 8 years before it finally was published. Julie Powell gained her notoriety by cooking her way through Julia Child's cookbook - 500 something recipes in 365 days - and blogging about it.

After the movie, I asked Eric what he would blog about for a year. We didn't come up with something right away. But plenty of people have done it. Like the "Year of Slow-Cooking" blog by a woman who made something in her crockpot everyday - from casseroles to breads to desserts. Or Kevin Roose, whose "Unlikely Disciple" blog followed his "study abroad" year at Liberty University.

I've actually had some pretty good ideas, but I'll keep them to myself in case this whole doctorate things doesn't work out. (haha) It's just fun to think about.

During one of our days in the UK, we got to spend the morning and early afternoon in Hampton Court Palace and the rest of the day in Windsor. It was a royal castle extravaganza.

Hampton Court was the favorite residence of Henry VIII. It now functions as a tourist attraction kind of like a permanent renaissance festival. It has actors portraying Henry and his court on the day of his sixth wedding. You can tour the kitchens which have been designed to recreate the actual medieval kitchen experience. There was even a falconer. We enjoyed touring the kitchens and apartments, but perhaps the most impressive part is the gardens. They are huge and ornate, filled with interesting trees, flowers, and fountains. They were beautiful. They also had an old hedge maze built for King William. It is the most famous hedge maze in the world, so we had to take a stab at it. We almost gave up, but in the end, we persevered and triumphed. It was fun.

Later that afternoon, we headed over to Windsor, a beautiful city on the Thames famous for being the home of Eton and the weekend palace for the royals. We toured the palace, and it was amazing. The exterior is huge and formidable. The interiors are elaborate and filled with expensive treasures and artwork. It is hard to imagine that people actually live in this place. The queen wasn't there while we were, so we didn't see her or any of the other royals. Still it was really interesting. Out of the four castles we saw, this was by far the most impressive. Later we took a river cruise along the Thames that was very nice and quiet. We saw lots of the beautiful countryside around Windsor. We also saw lots of swans. During our time in Europe I think I took about ten pictures of swans because I had never seen one before. I think Lauran was less impressed. Finally, the Bowsers came out to pick us up that night, and we had dinner at a great Indian food restaurant (Brits' favorite food).

Our last day in the UK, the Bowsers took us out to Bath about 1 and 1/2 hours west of where they live. It is an old resort town where the Romans originally built some thermal baths and spas, the only location of a natural hot water spring in the UK. It is beautiful because it is nestled in a valley along the River Avon. We toured the baths which are over 2000 years old, probably the oldest place I have ever been. We also visited the Jane Austen Centre, which was fun since we both like her. She apparently hated the time she lived in Bath, but that didn't stop them from capitalizing on her success. On the way back home, we drove past Stonehenge, so I could see it. It is impressive, but much more "in ruins" than I expected it to be. I didn't realize that some of the stones had fallen over.

We had such a great time in the UK. We were sad to leave, and we owe much thanks to the Bowsers for being such great hosts and tour guides. We are blessed to have friends like them.

Things I missed while we were traveling:

1. Family and friends (the obvious answer)
2. Charmin toilet paper
3. Water (restaurants give you shot glasses of water, if they give it at all)
4. Our dog Morgan



Things I did not miss:

1. Driving a car
2. My cell phone
3. Normal responsibilities
4. Super-sized anything

Eric was set on taking the double-decker bus tour, and it really is a great way to see the city, so we spent the better part of a day on the "coach". He was also really set on sitting on the top, which was fine except the first 30 minutes when it was raining like mad. But I toughed it out b/c I love him, covered in a very unfashionable poncho.

Thankfully the sun came out in time for the Thames river cruise part of the tour, guided by a delightfully funny Brit with a classic dry humor. He referred to the London Eye as the London "eyesore" and a lot of other clever things I can't remember. I guess you had to be there.

We toured Westminster Abbey, my second time there. It's a little weird b/c it's basically a really ornate, indoor cemetery, and we're walking around with an audio guide. But the abbey itself is beautiful and I enjoyed hearing the Cantor's remarks on Anglican faith. Eric of course spent a good amount of time in Poet's Corner.

The rest of the afternoon we spent on the bus tour, with just one stop at Notting Hill. We weren't there on market day, but Portobello Road is still a great little street and it's a cool area.

We were fortunate to get tickets to see Wicked in a West End theater that night. Actually we were totally freaking out about it, b/c we've been trying to see this musical since we met. It exceeded our expectations and we had a blast. I didn't know much about the actual storyline but Eric had read the book, and we both enjoyed it immensely.