by Fitz | Dec 25, 2013 | Journal
This picture is from Christmas eleven years ago when Tommy was only two weeks old, and now all of them—and Gio and Pipo–are playing charades or some such game in the dining room, shouting and laughing at each other’s miscues and fortifying another enduring memory into the mosaic of their lives. For me, it is another reminder that everything in my life is worthy of this moment, made this moment, and remembers this moment because it validates and makes sense of the patterns and actions Denise and I follow and create as parents–patterns and actions that we question in the moment and agonize over in retrospect (and all too often regret) but through the distillation of experience, the guidance of faith, and the search for perfection within imperfection become the patterns and actions that made us and make us a family. And so a band of small kids gathered around the mystery in a cradle eleven years ago can become a gaggle of kids gathered tonight around the only table they know, practicing a gift of love that anyone can know and live and create and sustain, for if we have faith in love, then we have faith, and it is a faith worth living, if only to give a bit of light to the mystery. Merry Christmas
by Fitz | Dec 10, 2013 | Essays, Journal, Teaching
Just closed the lid, so to speak, on what seems to be weeks of school-related paperwork. I am excited to go to my classes tomorrow with only those classes on my mind–not the letters home to parents, the secondary school recs, the grades and comments to homeroom teachers, but just a bunch of teenagers looking to get through the day with a bit of joy, a tad of knowledge, and hopefully sloppy joes for lunch–and not much homework. This feels like the time of the school year when we produce too much and harvest too little as we feed the insatiable measuring machine.
I wonder sometimes why we assess “when” we do. The notions of terms or semesters is pretty ingrained in every educational system I know of, but I just don’t know the real reason. It is a sincere question. Maybe we should learn in short stretches of time–like three months or so, such that the year is divided into fourths and one fourth is rest and the rest of the fourths is, well…the three legs of the race…and that would work, right?
I really have not met anyone that has a massively compelling reason why we stop the wheels and give a semester grade except for because–it’s the end of the semester.
Not the most profound question to cast out there, but it is the question that is sending me to my sleep.
If you have the answer, let me know.
by Fitz | Dec 10, 2013 | Essays, Journal, Teaching
How about we all take the bull by the horns and make this blog thing work! Your job this week is to do something with your blog that is powered by the passion that is in you. Passion is the one thing you have some control over. There are plenty of smarter, more gifted, and more interesting writers out there than me or you–but there shouldn’t be a more passionate writer. For better or worse, your blog is you–as my blog is me, and until you want a better you and I want a better me, readers will find another place to go.
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by Fitz | Dec 7, 2013 | Journal
It has been a long time since I wrote a simple old “this is what I am going to do today” post. So this is what I am going to do today: [and trust me, it will have nothing–absolutely nothing–to do with school work:)] Before the true winter settles in, I am going to try and install a wood stove hearth in our family room AND install a stainless steel chimney outside. I never like starting things when I don’t have a clear visual in my head, but for this, I can’t afford the outrageous price that installers charge–usually much more than the usual carpenter’s wage. I have my permits; I met with the inspector, an I am confident that I’ll figure it all out. I’ll even take some pictures because I finally figured out (actually Kerry from camp just figured out) why my iPhone takes such horrible pictures–the lens was dirty.
Maybe I won’t be able to figure things out.
We’ll see, I guess.
One last sip of coffee…and here I go…
by Fitz | Dec 4, 2013 | Poetry
Moaning like a lost whale
the thin ice
bellowed behind us
then cracked and rang
as if spit from a whip.
The sharp steel of
my over-sized skates
etched unspeakable joy
into the slate-grey,
reptilian skin
of Walden Pond.
Our mismatched hands
gripped together
in the fading light
of a January afternoon,
And you pulled me
onto untouched darker ice
where fathers
should never take sons.
You circled tighter
and, spinning like a bullfighter,
you let me go,
splayed across the ice,
arms outstretched,
screaming to you
into the black hole
of memory.
