What Are Untrained Minds Made Of?

Good grief. For all my buddies and Sister who don't have a clue what "the boards" are all about, just skip this one.

I keep forgetting one of my unspoken tenants of life: people are stupid. I am a humanist, don't get me wrong, and very "pro-people" in general. However. People can be very stupid. And it is so very often the people who think they're being smart that turn out to be the most stupid sometimes.

I get disappointed, I want to rant, I want to shake the sense into people. But it's essentially my fault for forgetting that most of the time: people are stupid.

How much brains does it take and how fucking long does it take to train them to figure out when someone is trying to shit with you? And how little guts does it take and how many brain cells does it take to shut up and apologize when you have the wrong idea about something? Apparently more than one homeschooling curriculum can provide.

People need to get a real life. What fucking hypocritical idiots.

Oh, for whoever started this shit, I'm sure you're pleased with the number of people who are writing/talking about the little dump you took on the carpet. Whatever. Get a life.

"What Are Little Girls Made Of?"

My folks used to sing and perform mountain music when I was a little girl. In fact, I was in a family band for about 10 years. We were pretty popular on "the circuit." The songs were very old. We didn't do bluegrass (although we could). We did mainly ballads and old songs some of which can be traced into the 1600s. The same stuff my mother's grandmothers used to sing. I'm going to try to link a site that has some of those tunes on it, because it'll play the music for you too. It's called the contemplator, but it isn't mine.

So anyway, I've always made it a point to sing them to Dante. Just so he knows them. Plus, they're full of murder, darkness and excitement most of the time, so he's fascinated. One of his favorites is called "What Are Old Women Made Of?" And it's kind of like the nursery rhyme. The basic lilt is something like this:

What are old women made of, made of?
What are old women made of?
Gigs and reels and old spinning wheels,
That's what old women are made of.

The format is the same, only for old men it's 'backer (tobacco) and brandy and peppermint candy. For little boys it's pidgins and pails and puppy dog tails, which Dante likes very much. For little girls it should go sugar and spice and all things nice. I usually keep making things up for other pets or babies because he doesn't want the song to end.

Right before he left, he wanted lots of songs and it was so hard to do, because music is such an emotional experience. Especially if you're the one who has to sing about babies being lost in the woods and laying down and dying, or mothers who lose their children to sickness when the children go away. Oh, and my personal favorite starts, "Hush little baby don't you cry, you know your mother was born to die." Did not go over well with either of us.

I sang to him as much as I could, but we cried a lot when I did it. I'd get halfway through and remember how he used to look at me in my arms when he was an infant and I sang the same song, those big eyes widening, sucking on his bottle ferociously at the most exciting parts. I remember when he was about 4 years old and would stop me after every single line (ARRGHH) to ask "What's that mean? Why'd he do that? What's this word mean?" And legitmate questions they were, but come on, when you're singing you do NOT like to be interrupted. Maybe it was the child diva in me. It would go something like "Hush little baby--" "Why??" "--don't you cry--" "Why? What made it cry? What's it crying over?" "You know your mama--" "Do we know the mama? Who's the mama?" "--was born to die--" "What's that mean? Why'd she die? How was she born if the baby is there?" And that's a song that doesn't have ancient words he didn't understand in it.

Still, it was a moment of pride when he belted out all the verses to "Henry Martin", a rousing (and long) ballad about a pirate who sinks a ship, in front of one of my professors during a conference.

Well, now he wants songs over the phone. Which is still kind of hard on me, but if I don't have to look at him, it's easier to get through it. We-ell. Apparently the words to "What Are Old Women Made Of?" have changed with the experience of living day to day with a little 5 year old step sister. We were going along at a good clip with the song, and I began "What are little girls made of, made of? What are little girls made of?" And he cuts in still in tune, "Aggrevation and irritation and taking all your stuff, and stealing your books and bothering you and everything else bad. No sugar or spice. And they ain't nice." I nearly fell over laughing.

Welcome to the real world, son. Sisters can be a circle of hell I can't really get you through! (Sorry, Sister, LOL!)

--Virgil

Underpaid Brilliance

I am loving working for the Literacy Center. I am "assistant director", but since it's basically me and the director, I could probably pick out any title I want. They're all up for grabs. We work in an office the size of of a bathroom, and everything is stacked to the ceiling. It looks like a literacy bomb hit it. Papers are everywhere, as the Dir. is a "visual" person and color codes everything and tapes it out where she can see it. It is a lot of work, and we get paid very little. I have no clue what I'm doing.

The nice thing is, she knows that. So, I get to come in and tunnel through the papers until I can figure something out. The filing system is a wreck. My Dir., S, doesn't really use the filing cabinets as she basically color codes the walls, and her former asst. had a method that frankly makes no sense to me. Or to S. Considering I added 15 new files to it today, I feel like I'm more a part of the problem rather than the solution.

I'm so pleased to have S as a Dir. She's a beer-swiggin', harley-ridin' idiot. Her words, not mine. We get to cuss a lot, wear what we want and listen to loud rock. I've heard more Ozzy and AC/DC in the past 2 days than I have for probably a year. Under a steep learning curve, I'm figuring out so much. The only part that concerns me is fundraising. The nice thing is I get 25% of whatever fundraising activity I arrange and pull off. The bad news is, my fundraising activity may be the only thing that gets us into a new building, which we DESPERATELY need. Organizations will fund everything except rent and a decent salary. For some reason, maintaining an actual *space* for this to happen in and making sure people get paid enough to not have to leave for a living wage isn't very high on their priority list. And we ain't talking big salaries here, folks. We're both *under* the poverty line. Thank goodness neither of us absolutely have to have the money. But they'll give you all the Office Depot money you want. Add to the stakes that I have never raised a fund before :) . Yikes!

Sadly, I am not a black man.

Hopefully, after an extremely steep learning curve and a few hours, there will be a picture here of Dante at the fishing hole.

Lordy, I miss him.

He's gone to stay with his father, who lives 7 hours away. It was the thing to do at the time. It seems to be the thing to do with the rest of his childhood. I know, I know, he's only been gone 2 months. My spidey-sense is tingling, though, and it says he isn't coming back.

Can I help it if I'm not a black man? He sort of called me out on that, and I had to be like, "Well, son, you got me there." I blame hormones. His, not mine. He hated moving to West Virginia (good God, who could blame him?) and he had gotten really attached to his dad before we left. They saw each other every weekend, which was a big switch from him not calling at all when he was a toddler. They just sort of...grew into each other.

And now, Daddy is the largest figure in his life. When we were having a really tough day after we'd had several weeks worth of tough days, it just all came tumbling out. "Maybe you ought to go live with your father for a little while." I had said. He burst into tears. So did I. "I'm not mad at you," I had said. "You just aren't very happy here. Maybe you'd be happier if you stayed with Daddy." We were just getting to the point where everything was an argument. Breakfast was an argument. Did we love each other? You bet. Maybe we were just too much alike.

He rubbed his eyes and nodded. "Yes," he said. "I want to live with Daddy." "You can change your mind, you know," I said. "I know," he said. He was a different boy from that day on. No more bickering, no pointless arguments. I'm sure I had fed the fire myself. He is MY child, after all. He just withdrew his firewood. Until we left for Kentucky, he would say, "I'm going to miss you so much." And we'd cry a little. But he never said he didn't want to go.

In the end, we hugged and cried at the last minute. At his dad's apartment, he got up and showed me all his new chores (which he was weirdly excited about), and announced that the first thing he did when he came home from school was his homework. He whispered at the last minute that he had changed his mind, but I think that was because I was about to leave and it hurt, and taking it back would make the hurt stop. I told him it was too late to change his mind, but in the summer if he wanted to come home, I'd sure pack everything up and move him right back.

Since then, he does more for himself, he talks more "grown up" and he has a busy little life. It's tough to be the 8:30 phone call. I don't know what he has for breakfast or what he wore to school, and half the time he'll shrug (I can hear it through the phone) and say "I don't know" when I ask. I'm the part time parent now. I still don't know how I feel about that. He never talks about coming back, only when am I "coming down" for a visit. I suspect he'll stay.

I only hope that by getting out of his way, I've helped him get a bit closer to finding it.

--Virgil

Aposto-Fest

I was thinking on my way down to the conference (Lo-oong drive) about how I don't post what my former religion actually was. BridgetJ had asked, and I thought I'd been cute in giving clues about knocking on people's doors and pestering them with religion. I was thinking especially about how I'm super hesitant to give out information about myself and what "happened" to me in that religion.

See, when I was 18 almost 19, I was officially kicked out--they call it disfellowshipping--and what that means is that no one from the church can have contact with me except my direct family members. And they used to prohibit family members. Now, that's not such a bad thing, as these people are sheeple, and have nothing of any interest whatsoever to say, and start off every exclamation with "Oh, my word!" But when you're 19, it's tough when everybody who's known you since you were born pretends that they literally don't see you standing there and can't hear you speak.

Most people can't take the pressure, I think, solely based on empirical evidence from all the people I know who got kicked out and eventually went back in. I think they feel awkward in the real world, because they've been taught to stay separate from it, and they have this heavy psychological burden from being shunned. When you don't believe you're going to heaven, and you don't believe in such a thing as a hell, and you're only version of an afterlife is revoked, you kind of...drift, I guess. There is nothing but this moment, and the moment doesn't feel good. It's a moment for Nietzsche--you know, staring into the abyss and the abyss staring into you?

The normal people out there, the "worldly" people, have no idea what it's like to live in a cult, one that's out there walking around in normal life, not holed up taking poison to get to the mothership. See, when you've got family back in it, you feel like you have to walk on eggshells to preserve that. You may despise the religion, and be getting on just fine without it, but then there's Mom. And you love her, and you want to be able to talk like normal to her. But you have to realize (Sister, this is for you) that you can't make her open her eyes and see what you see. She has to see it for herself. So you cut a lot of ties, and it's hard for you to make new ones.

The thing I was worried about is the ultimate step they take called "apostasy". Now, all they can do is basically declare you an "apostate." They don't brand you with an iron or anything. But that's when your family can't have any contact with you at all. Ever. You're basically, like, a lesser demon or imp or maybe a succubus I guess. Devil's minion walking around in human flesh.

They only apostasize for speaking "against" their religion or trying to actively work against it. Consequently, the people who raise the best points are the ones most likely to get branded "demon". I know just as sure as I'm sitting here typing that they would love to do this to me. They've lobbied against me even coming into town to visit my mother, even though it's clearly within their rules for her. They marked me as an "influence", probably because I have half a brain, and so they watch me when I go from town to town. The congregations in towns I moved to knew about me before I'd even unpacked the last box. I don't think they know my new last name or where I am now. It's just been a big surprise to me that I cared so much that they don't know. At least I never had to wear magic undies.

I'll let ya'll guess what religion it is, and then I'll post what it is. The clues are, they don't believe in going to heaven or hell, they don't believe in the Trinity, they don't celebrate any holidays, and they don't take blood transfusions.

After all, this religion is a crock of shit. I believe the previous statement qualifies me for apostasy.

I was online last night looking up fellow ex-religionists on the web. They have a sort of mini convention for us booted out people each year. They call it Aposto-fest. They even have T-shirts! Sister, would you like to go too? Aposto-fest 2006 is in South Carolina this year!

Wah-Wah-Whiney-Poo

My husband and I used to joke that this would be his Indian name, if he were more native than he already is. Then we decided that we probably made a racist statement and have stopped referring to it as his Native name and just refer to Wah-Wah-Whiney-Poo as a state of being.

I'm in that state now.

He had a conference in Louisville Thursday morning, so we drove all day Wednesday to get there. And then we drove all the way back on Thursday afternoon. My back is killing me and my nerves are shot.

Do you have any conception of how utterly boring English conferences really are? I wish I could convey it properly, but I wouldn't want you to chew off your legs to get out of my mind trap. Lots of people go, but the panels are actually quite small--three or four presenters, and a few people there to listen. This ain't the sciences, where important findings are being presented.

The presenters get up and read from the paper they wrote. Just read it out loud. Being in graduate school/being professors often makes no difference to the way most people read a paper. Monotone. Speaking too low or too fast. English/Literature is currently going through the "lets make up all of our own words" phase in an effort to seem more philosophical and more social sciency. It is so incredibly pretentious and bo-ring.

Why do I go? Because my husband doesn't handle stress well. Sorry, babe, if you're reading this, but you know it's true. I call into evidence exhibit A: that accident on I-65 that nearly kept us from making it on time. Ahhh-freak out! I could go on, but suffice it to say that my unofficial job was to make sure he got there physically, mentally and emotionally in one piece. It's a tougher job than it sounds.

I also go to pose difficult questions and to generally be an ass when I can to the presenters. Every presentation has it's heckler, and that would be me at English conferences. It breaks up the monotony. On my husband's very first presentation, I was accidentally HIS heckler. I thought I'd lobbed a softball, and I guess he just wasn't prepared. I was trying to help. I felt pretty guilty about it for a little while.

Except for seeing my wonderful Sister, none of the heckling was worth the incredible back pain and shot nerves I have today. I tried to relax with a whiskey last night, until my wonderful overly dramatic husband overly dramatized his sneeze and I spilled the damn thing all over my bathrobe.

Wah-Wah-Whiney-Poo.

Just Leave 'Em Be!

I have just got to say something about all the discussion I'm seeing on that "other" board.

"What do you do about children who don't seem to be motivated by anything?"
"Am I too hard on my children?"
"Am I expecting too much?"
"All of the joy has gone out of our day."

And my personal favorite was the one who thought her child might *gasp* be AVERAGE. Here's the text that really got my knickers twisted:

"I read WTM and think that I want the best for ds and want him to excel, to be well-educated, well-read, intelligent, able to clearly express himself, etc. But I don't know if he's really such an exceptional student that he will end up being Ivy League material. In all honesty he's a pretty average kid - bright, but not exceptional. But if I don't give him the rigorous education, am I depriving him of opportunities later on? I guess the question is - Is WTM written for every child or just the exceptional ones? I don't want to push ds so hard that he absolutely hates school and resents learning. Tell me it's okay to just let him be a kid for now, to allow him to be 'average'."

Umm...It's OK. What is with people who expect their kids to be these little Latin automatons who never misbehave, quote fine poetry for fun and I suppose now we can add wear prayer hem clothing?? Whatever happened to simply teaching kids how to think for themselves and how to learn? Who cares about Ivy Leagues?

It became ragingly apparent to me after using the Well Trained Mind as a spine for a few short weeks that this *wasn't*going*to*work*. It would've been great for me as a kid. My own son hated it. Within weeks we were doing lots of reading, lots of playing outside and I was making up more things for him to do than Rainbow Resource could hold in their catalog!

If your kids aren't motivated, maybe there's a good reason they shouldn't be. How many of us give our absolute 100% best effort at a job we despise? If they ain't liking it, find a way around that. But for heaven's sakes, don't break the kid's spirit. I think in general, lots of personal experiences and being able to read well are the basis for an educated mind. Or a mind that seeks to know.

But I get the feeling that most of these people don't want their children to "seek" anything. The parents might not like what they find! I think that's what disappointed me most on the board (and that was BEFORE I saw the Xtian mobs at work!); that this wasn't the quest for knowledge and to join the Great Conversation. It was essentially to show out (look my 3-year-old is doing Latin!) and to super impose some sort of mythical Xtian value system on top of Western culture.

I know I'm an idealist. All I want, though, is for my Dante to embrace the world with open arms and feel confident that he can have a piece of whatever he wants. And that he not get caught up in any Circles of Hell (that's what I'm here for).

--Virgil

True Religion

Some thoughts occurred to me from the posts here and on others' blogs. I think "true" religion has been hijacked by most organized churches and the people that run them. I can honestly say that I never truly believed in God. When I prayed it felt like I was talking to myself. I had one campus preacher declare smugly, "Oh, you knew God when you were a child." Nope. Sorry.

But I did eventually realize that the "spiritual" feeling I think true believers get does occur in me. The only really spiritual feeling I got when I was younger and doing something churchy was when I helped out someone else. When we took food to an old person or a sick person, cleaned their house, got their groceries or just sat around and talked because they rarely got company, it felt good. It felt uplifting and inspiring. It felt spiritual.

For many years I would involuntarily snort whenever someone mentioned the words "faith" or "religion" out loud. I really haven't gotten over this habit, so I shouldn't act like I have. A friend pointed out some time back that we all need spirituality, or else we have a hole in the completeness of our lives. At the time I shrugged and said to myself, "Guess I'll live without it, then. Better than the alternative." But I figured out that I got the feeling of completeness through service of another sort.

So now I volunteer. I teach adults to read, and I teach immigrants how to speak English. I work part time for our division of the Literacy Volunteers of America. A hard job with lousy pay. I still don't believe in God. But I got my spirituality back. It feels *great*.

Oh, and it has the added bonus of no one slamming doors in my face anymore, *snicker*. No more looking at people half dressed and mad as hell and getting the "You people go ANYWHERE, don't you??" responses. Yep. Help to those who really want it, and no more "spiritual" assault on other people's Saturday mornings!

Fundies Gone Wild

OK. I figured out what I'd like to post about first. And I'll start by saying that (if I believed in an afterlife) that there should be a special circle of hell for certain fundy CULT religions. Although at the time it was quite painful, one of the best things that ever happened to me in life was getting booted out of the fundy religious cult I grew up in. Now my sister has wisely decided that this brand of "organized" religion isn't for her. Whoo-hoo!!!

But guess who has come out in force to make her pay for it?

You got it. A bunch of older men who get their rocks off by sniffing people's asses to see if they smell. These fuckers have been STALKING my sister, trying to get enough "evidence" of wrongdoing so they can boot her out and I suppose "cleanse" the congregation in the process. See, it's bad news when you choose for yourself, at least for fundies. That might imply that there was something *wrong* in the congregation that caused her to leave. So, if they can make it look like she's the biggest sinner this side of the city, they can just do their version of "excommunication" on her. This comes with the practical effect that no one in this religion would be allowed to talk to her (not that they have anything interesting to say in the first place). That way, they can't ask questions and maybe figure out the TRUTH.

So they've been casing her apartment with bright lights in white vans and following her around the city. What a bunch of losers. Don't they have someone's needs to minister to? Honestly, they way they treat former members has done more to turn people off of their cult, I mean, religion than anything us "fallen" children have ever done.

I hate religion.

Testing, Testing, 1, 2, 3...

Wow. Blogness! It feels like one of these fads that I swore I'd never try myself, like a bad 80's perm. Unfortunately, mine lasted into the early 90's.

So, I've been thinking about writing a blog because it looks like so much fun. Plus, I'd like to bitch about everything for the free therapy, too! I don't even know where to start. Should I rant about something, or post some clever observation on the human condition? Stay tuned.

--Virgil

"The World was all before them..." Milton, Paradise Lost, at the very end