A Young Now

Christmas is over, and the decorations are coming down in showers tinsel and pine needles.

This part of the holidays always makes me sad. I want the before Christmastime to go on forever. Anticipation is best, with all the wrapping paper secrets and sugar cookie baking. But the after is nice too in its own way - - quieter and more reserved than the before, who rushes towards the after in a flurry of airy movement.

Ray Bradbury writes in Dandelion Wine, "you're not the dates, or the ink, or the paper. You're not those trunks of junk and dust. You're only you, here, now - - the present you."

Even though before is wonderful, after is best, because after is who you are.

"You're in the present, you're trapped in a young now or an old now, but there is no other now to be seen."

Christmas Eve

Last night i stayed up to welcome Christmas Eve in. I can't believe tomorrow's Christmas...can someone slow down time please?

Over the summer i taught my Vietnamese students about American holidays. I showed them how to make Valentines, which caused much blushing and a few teasingly said, "I love you, Teacher."

I showed them how to make turkeys by tracing their hands and coloring in the beak and feet. I told them we made turkey hands for Thanksgiving. They called them chickens.

And i told them about Christmas, about the trees and stockings and cookies. I even tried to explain snow, but only got them to understand that it was like crushed ice that fell from the skies.

Sometimes I miss that crazy Saturday morning class.

Blank

I'm supposed to be writing for my Creative non-fiction class. But ideas won't come. I've tried typing, handwriting, writing in pen, in pencil, in colored pencil! For goodness sakes, this must stop.

But I did come across a beautifully decorated house on Design Sponge (which is my new favorite website).

Check it out . . .

http://www.designspongeonline.com/2010/10/sneak-peek-ma-mamie-hippie.html

Beautiful, right? hmm.

B-A-N-A-N-A-S!

One morning this summer, my teammates and I decided to walk down the street to the indoor market to purchase some fruits and vegetables. Usually we bought street food for meals, but after the twentieth bowl of Pho (beef noodle soup), we needed some variety.

For simple purchases like chopsticks and bowls we never had a problem communicating in broken Vietnamese and hand motions, but buying fresh produce turned out to be complicated.
After much hand-waving, we ended up with a sad bunch of bananas . . . which turned out to be plantains. We tried frying them, but they smelled so bad, that our sweet landlady ran up the stairs, scolding us in Vietnamese and threw them out.
The next morning, we were in the living room lesson planning when our landlady came in with a giant clump of bananas.
Excitement!

Vietnam Days

It's been three months since I left little Bien Hoa, Vietnam, and I still haven't written about it like I have wanted to. So I'm going to begin posting pictures and stories from my summer, just small, enjoyable stories that I have been thinking about lately.

Story number one: Laundry.

I wish i had taken a picture of our sad washing machine; it fought hard for us. After washing our clothes, we hung them on long metal poles that crossed above the courtyard.
Like this.




And while they dried, our landlady cooked . . . directly beneath our laundry. Our clothes always dried with the scent of Vietnamese dinner. Sometimes i miss laundry days at the hotel, even if my clothes dried crunchy and smelled like food.

Pumpkin Goop

...This is how we carve pumpkins...

Indian Pudding

I had my wisdom teeth pulled yesterday morning, and so i am confined to pudding and mashed potatoes. What a sad fate.
But i was determined to make the best of it, so this morning i cooked some Indian pudding for myself. It almost tasted like pumpkin pudding, but more cornmeal.