The sunset is fabulous: I can see the water from where I'm working this evening, and the sunlight is turning a mellow color like the skin of a pear, while the water is reflecting the blue, blue sky. Tomorrow we're supposed to have sunshine again, and on Saturday the high will be close to 90. We shouldn't be falling for this stage dressing, though. This sunny forecast is lies, all lies. The truth is sitting there on the lawn, as blatant as an Adam Sandler movie. The first toadstools of fall are popping up all over the place.
The spiders know all about this, of course. They've been congregating in my apartment. I'm refusing to sublet. As a matter of fact, I'm squishing the spiders and flushing the remains. Then, of course, I do one of those girly "Ewww -- Ick!" things where I jump up and down for a few seconds. I just so do not like the way their bodies crunch. Maybe by winter I'll have adjusted to their moving in.
Heck, by winter I may have come up with a way for them to take over the rent.
Schoolwork is running ahead, often with me running behind as fast as I can. Despite the school bookstore being unable to stock enough of the books for some classes, the reading and other assignments need to be done. By the second week of class, some of us are still scrambling to come up with copies of the various assigned books. Week 3 is coming up fast, and I don't feel inclined to be patient. Do you hear, Barnes and Noble?
Perhaps they respond better to persuasive letters. Missive #1 will be written Monday night if I can't find my English and Philosophy texts on the shelves by then.
In the meantime, I hear the seductive voice of Dr. Faustus calling from my backpack. All 154 page of him, due at 9 tomorrow morning, with discussion topics. Yep, the glamourous life of the single coed in the state capital.
Showing posts with label Faustus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Faustus. Show all posts
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Saturday, September 5, 2009
The First Week
Bits of my old life keep falling away. Last night, as I was lugging all the books, notebooks, and assorted stuff into the house, my Northwest Hospital commuter cup fell on the ceramic tiled kitchen floor and broke. Not a big deal, but another link to the person I used to be.
The person I've become in this first week of school is struggling. I misread my class schedule, so I missed the first sessions of both Math and Ethics. Amazingly, I'm not behind in Math: I read the chapter and wrote the haiku. Ethics, though, is another matter. Father Pratt used words I hadn't heard in years, and there are a lot of things to catch up on. So far, I've written two tiny little essays in the composition book, unfortunately in a cramped version of my usual scrawl, and read the first chapter in a really good book titled Why Can't We Be Good?; next I need to read the Crito and create a rough draft of a research paper by Tuesday. So what will topic of the paper be, you ask? To allow the part of my soul with an inclination toward evil to speak, damned if I know.
Seriously, I recommend reading Jacob Needleman's book. Why Can't We Be Good? addresses the only philosophical question I've ever cared about; having worked with some monumentally unkind people and observed how they treat each other, the questions addressed in the book speak to daily experience. So many questions, like, does every driver in Olympia believe they must tailgate at all times, boil down to the title of Needleman's book.
The English classes are moving along. This holiday weekend, I get to read Faustus twice, read four essays, write two summaries, read four chapters and complete a take-home test -- all due Wednesday. The 18-year-old me would be thinking this could all wait until Tuesday evening, but the incredibly ancient me needs to get this stuff done, if at all possible, today -- tomorrow morning at the latest. After a week of trying to improve my time management skills, I am ready for a day or so when life just happens. I think it might be called Labor Day.
The part-time job has turned up a surprising bonus: I've lost two pounds in the last week. Either watching people eat depresses the appetite, or I really was a slug before I started school. The slug hypothesis, to create a really bad pun, carries the most weight.
The person I've become in this first week of school is struggling. I misread my class schedule, so I missed the first sessions of both Math and Ethics. Amazingly, I'm not behind in Math: I read the chapter and wrote the haiku. Ethics, though, is another matter. Father Pratt used words I hadn't heard in years, and there are a lot of things to catch up on. So far, I've written two tiny little essays in the composition book, unfortunately in a cramped version of my usual scrawl, and read the first chapter in a really good book titled Why Can't We Be Good?; next I need to read the Crito and create a rough draft of a research paper by Tuesday. So what will topic of the paper be, you ask? To allow the part of my soul with an inclination toward evil to speak, damned if I know.
Seriously, I recommend reading Jacob Needleman's book. Why Can't We Be Good? addresses the only philosophical question I've ever cared about; having worked with some monumentally unkind people and observed how they treat each other, the questions addressed in the book speak to daily experience. So many questions, like, does every driver in Olympia believe they must tailgate at all times, boil down to the title of Needleman's book.
The English classes are moving along. This holiday weekend, I get to read Faustus twice, read four essays, write two summaries, read four chapters and complete a take-home test -- all due Wednesday. The 18-year-old me would be thinking this could all wait until Tuesday evening, but the incredibly ancient me needs to get this stuff done, if at all possible, today -- tomorrow morning at the latest. After a week of trying to improve my time management skills, I am ready for a day or so when life just happens. I think it might be called Labor Day.
The part-time job has turned up a surprising bonus: I've lost two pounds in the last week. Either watching people eat depresses the appetite, or I really was a slug before I started school. The slug hypothesis, to create a really bad pun, carries the most weight.
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