While We Were Sleeping

Not long after I posted a blog entry on Dec. 5, 2014, saying I was taking a sabbatical from blogging, but would return if I had something to say, all of sudden I felt overwhelmed with potential blog topics.

For one, a week after the Dec. 5 post, I flew to Texas to help younger daughter pack, clean, and move on from her life and studies at the University of North Texas. That same trip I stayed with and had what I fully expected to be the final farewell with my beloved aunt. (And, it was.) Eager to put miles and memories of Texas behind her, my liberal daughter couldn’t drive east fast enough.

Some 1,076 miles later, my daughter and I got home in time for Christmas and a California family crisis. A bomb, of sorts, had exploded. This turn of events – medical crises, hastily arranged visits, roiling emotions, amongst an abundance of dysfunction, was simply too intense, too personal, too much to blog about.  Someday, maybe I can transform the characters and events of that time into something, perhaps a dark story or bleak play. Now, I could barely craft a Tweet on the topic.

The good news:  my mother is alive and well. And, my “nuclear” family rallied. I am gratified by the stoic support of my husband and daughters. Even Piper pitched in with unwavering canine support.

This is what unwavering canine support looks like.

Teaching and driving to App State in Boone over the spring semester was a welcome distraction, except for the day a hurried pickup truck driver slammed into my daughter’s car. In a sweet change of roles, she was driving me to school. Fortunately, we were uninjured, but we said goodbye to a trusted means of transport.  I loved that car, originally mine, but blogging about a car. Okay, it could have been about loss, fragility, the unfairness of fate.

April brought another possible blog topic:  my brand-spanking-new Medicare card. I turned 65 and getting that card seemed a big demarcation point. You are young, or at least not old, and you don’t have Medicare.

Then, suddenly, there’s a Medicare card in your wallet and you are old. Okay, I’ve been hearing from AARP for years, but this is different: 65 means senior citizen. As an official senior citizen, I am grateful for my health and for the Medicare benefits that will help me maintain it and my quality of life. Oh, I’m checking into those senior discounts. Oooh, thank you, Delta Air Lines.

It’s mid-May, my sabbatical over. I’m restless and feel as if I should be working.  I don’t feel retired. This phase of life remains unsettling and uncharted.

I think I’ll go pull some weeds.

Six Words and a $10 Tomato

 It’s done. Well, it’s mostly done. The Wink and Glo Memorial Tomato Garden (WAGMTG) is planted. The soil was prepped (oh, my, the weeds), the plants put in the ground the best I know how, and, since this photo was taken, cages assembled to support their growing branches.

The soil and sun here is so phenomenal it should offset my shortcomings as a budding gardener.

Glo is Gloria, my late aunt. She died May 1 and in the last weeks of her life when I’d tell her my struggle to garden without hurting some body part, she’d tell me how Wink, her late husband, would joke about the $10 tomato – for all the expense and effort to grow one.

Now, these two – Wink and Glo – merit more than a memorial tomato garden, but it’s a start. Growing up, I loved telling friends, heck, telling anyone, I had an uncle named Wink and an aunt named Glo.  Nicknames are big in my mother’s family. My mom is Honey and Molo. Her aunts, well, I could never keep them straight – Polls, Lolly, Pills, oh, I give up.

When I was little, Wink and Glo were fun names and fun people. They hosted many a family gathering and watched my brother and me when we were little. It’s only when I reconnected with them years later that I realized how apt their names. Wink always had a joke or story. Sometimes it was a new joke, often an old story.

And, Glo, well, she glowed with love and laughter and life. In reading up on how to write an obituary I found some guidance. It said find six words that capture a person. Words for Glo: devoted, loving, fun, solid, loyal, and fair. She was so loyal, if she felt I’d been wronged, she’d say, “Do you want me to write and tell them?”

           

I’d say no, but appreciate the offer, the loyalty, and the love.

I miss you, Glo. See you in the garden.

Of Turtles and Teachers

It’s the tail end of Teacher Appreciation Week. I remember those weeks when our daughters were in elementary school. I’d put together a goody bag for their teachers and they’d dutifully tote them to school. One teacher was known for turtles. Pod C, possibly an Eastern Box Turtle, was the classroom mascot.

Later, I became friends with this teacher. My first time at her home stunned me. She had an entire étagère devoted to turtle display – stone, china, crystal, you name it.  Reptiles delivered over the years in goody bags.

Yes, she was a great teacher, and greatly appreciated.

I gained much more appreciation for teachers and teaching these past few months. A first-time adjunct instructor, I taught speechwriting to college students. I’d taught years before – BC, or before children – at a continuing education program. As I recall, it was three-hour evening sessions in a professional public relations certification program. My fear, then, was filling three evening hours.  Now, my fear with a night class would be sustaining my energy, oh, and staying awake.

This time, my biggest fear since these are college students taking the course for credit was being the “real deal” – actually transmitting knowledge and improving their skills so they could write for the ear, not the page. At least, they’d signed up for the class; that must mean they were interested in learning the craft.

Oops. On quizzing students on the first day, I found that most were in the class because they couldn’t get into the one they wanted (yeah, probably a class on writing for social media, thought the old fart standing in front of the room).  But, I did have one student who explained why he was taking the class, “I would like to effectively craft speeches with emotional teeth without being sappy or clichéd.”

Good. I like a challenge.

And, it was a challenge – coming up with a logical way to approach the topic, effective assignments, the best speeches to read and watch, grade papers constructively, and most of all build and sustain interest and energy.

About three weeks in, I realized that teaching is mostly performance.  You have a bunch of young people who’d rather be outside, or sleeping, or anywhere else, and the instructor must capture and hold their attention and interest. Otherwise, why be there – just have an online course. I came to this realization at the photocopying machine and remarked to a much younger colleague, “I just realized that teaching is all about performance.” He replied, “It took me three years to realize that.”

Okay, sometimes wisdom does come with age.

My neighbor, also an adjunct instructor, is a great teaching coach.  I adopted her trick of muttering “Showtime!” to myself on my way to room 102.  It works.

Each session, as I struggled to inject energy, to connect, to recognize, to praise, and to get all 18 involved, I gained even greater respect for educators who can control a classroom, command attention, and impart knowledge.

Could I get the slackers to show up (explaining the attendance policy was a big help), the shy ones to speak up (duh, call on them), and the capable ones to push their boundaries and abilities (ah, many are self starters)?

I learned a lot on the fly. Biggest lesson:  It helps to know what you’re talking about. It’s not like being a flack (public relations practitioner) where you’re always telling a reporter, “I’ll get back to you.” There is getting back – I did that a few times at the next class session –but it helps to answer questions in the moment.

The evaluation forms aren’t in yet. But, the final speeches:  Wow. There’s more to millennials than I realized, or as one student explained in her speech. “Millennials are creative team players who are ambitious in life and in the workplace.”

And, in the classroom. What a privilege to share that time and place with these students. I don’t have any turtles to show for it, but I got some complimentary emails and hugs and invited back next year.

Sweet.

Gentle Readers

I love that salutation and often used it on emails when I was doing something delicate, such as sending a controversial speech around to subject matter experts -- you know, the technical ISTJ engineers -- for comment.

Now, I use it to address the wonderful folks who have visited "Retirement and Relocation."  I haven't been writing for seven years (just over one), but still I need a sabbatical. My creative juices, such as they are, are all flowing into getting ready to teach next month. I really want to do a good job -- having written speeches I know how easily an audience can get bored, even if a grade depends on feigning attention.

So, for now, I am signing off.  But, if I have a great idea for one of these essays, I shall, like Gen. MacArthur, return. And, it may be that teaching will provide topics and ideas -- my own version of Up the Down Staircase. I will surely gather stories in the classroom, just as I plan to tell them.

Thank you, gentle readers, for joining me here in this time and space.

Life is good.


I am fortunate.


I am thankful.


Extremely so.

Now to do more to make it so for others.

Five Drafts, Or How I Learned to Write

I couldn’t wait for 6^th grade. I was in 4^th grade with the stern Mrs. Copper. My brother, lucky guy, had Miss Johnson for 6^th grade. She let her students write short stories.

I was ready. I had proof:  pages of loopy handwritten loopy stories.

Finally, I reached Miss Johnson’s class. No more stories. Decades before Virginia’s Standards of Learning, Miss Johnson dropped story writing. Had they – the administration – gotten to her? I’ll never know.

I am still disappointed.

Lexington, Va., had great teachers. I found still more in Fullerton, Calif. Yet, in 8^th grade I never learned how to diagram a sentence.  Mr. Hindman would put the chalk down mid-diagram and open a book of short stories. He’d read a suspenseful one out loud and stop just at the climax. Our assignment:  finish the story. I doubt my endings to “The Most Dangerous Game” and “The Lady or the Tiger” approached the originals, but I was having fun with writing and with school.

Troy High School offered a trifecta of teachers to instruct and inspire. Mr. Johnson, with his required daily essay, developed my writing muscle. An essay a day, he reasoned, would keep the Subject A at bay. It was the feared exam the University of California required all freshmen to take to demonstrate their command of the English language.

I passed.

Miss Long taught discipline in writing and the absolute importance of reviewing, rewriting, and revising some more. She instilled the notion that five drafts are a minimum.

Aren’t they?

Mr. Beaver – one of the best – instilled joy in the process and product. He taught history but what I remember is his assignment to write an essay about anything. Mine included observations of women shopping in LA’s garment district. I don’t recall the grade, but I treasure his comment:  “Funny.”

Yet, even with great teachers and my Brenda Starr-turn on the high school newspaper, I put aside writing as a career goal when I got to college. Ms. Magazine was years away, the job-wanted ads were divided by gender, and, to quote John Irving, I thought I had to be “of use.”

So, I got two degrees – a B.S. in child development and an M.L.S. – and after three uninspiring library job interviews I disabused myself of being of use. If I had to earn a living, and I did; dammit, I wanted to do something I enjoyed, which was working with words.

I entered the full-time work force as an editorial assistant at a place where they figured my undergrad degree would help me understand the jargon. It did. I edited academic articles, learned proofreader’s marks, got my first blue pencil, and realized I loved it all.

My growing skills, experience, and camera, led to a job at Allegheny Airlines, which offered an added benefit:  flying free! Doctor Seuss was right: “Oh, the places you’ll go.” To keep my flying privileges, I wrote newsletters, magazine articles, news releases, and annual report copy.

One day I asked the CEO about the future for a writer at the company.

“I’m giving a speech next week,” he said.

I had just got a booklet called How to Handle Speechwriting Assignments. I took it, along with reference books and a stack of yellow legal pads, and hid in the sales department conference room where I struggled to come up with a speech.

I'm sure it took far more than Miss Long's five drafts to write remarks for the Albany, N.Y. Chamber of Commerce. But I did it -- in longhand on lined yellow paper. Personal computers, much less word processors, were years away.

White Out was a speechwriter’s best friend.

And, that booklet was my lifesaver. (A special shout out to its author, Douglas Starr, now a renowned science writer and published author.)  

Among other communications assignments, I would write for Allegheny Airlines (later USAir) CEO -- Ed Colodny -- for the next 13 years. I would learn his biases and preferences, his likes and dislikes, his turns of phrase. I spent hours listening to him on my car tape player.

As a ghostwriter, I would develop a thick skin. There’s no choice for someone who writes for others. You are climbing into their egos, which brings rewards and risks. Your carefully developed draft might be unceremoniously flung to the floor with the declaration, “This is boring.”

That really happened. The speech was delivered word-for-word two days later.

I’ve written for a baker’s dozens of clients, male and female, young and old, well educated and school-of-hard-knocks products. Each would teach me more about the craft. From FAA Administrator Jane Garvey I learned the paramount importance of understanding the audience and targeting the message. She was masterful at owning the room.

My next client, Marion Blakey, another FAA administrator, had worked in the White House for the Great Communicator himself, President Ronald Reagan. I learned mechanics about type size and spacing, but more importantly, I learned about storytelling to convey a message. I spent more time looking for stories than writing; it’s well worth the effort.

My last client before I retired taught me about perfection, that is, aiming for it. Thirty-eight, or so, drafts could be exasperating (I exaggerate to make a point) but it was necessary. The product got better. The client began to own it. 

I learned about collaboration. I had long been the speechwriter flying solo. With Deborah Hersman, head of the National Transportation Safety Board, it was often a team effort, not always easy on a writer’s ego. We have them, too. Big time. (Full disclosure: Skin doesn’t thicken, it just scabs over.)

From Hersman, with her great speaking skill and passion for safety, I learned perhaps the biggest lesson:  The spoken word can change behavior and even save lives.

Speeches can be “of use.”

I’m fortunate to have had so many great teachers. But, can I be one? I start teaching speechwriting in January. I’ll have my notes, my syllabus and assignments, my worn speechwriting booklet, and more.

Better yet, I’ll have all these great teachers with me as I strive to be “of use” to my students.