"under review"

So I've been waiting along with everyone else* for my "economic stimulus" check--not a gift from George W. but a return on my investment as a tax-paying citizen. I wait and I wait and I wait. Then I get a letter from them with the word 'payment' stamped in HUGE red letters on the back. I think 'yippee!' and then I open it and find out that my check is "under review." Great.

I'm a single, childless, full-time employed worker with a taxable income of less than 50 grand a year. What are they reviewing? I didn't marry an alien, claim 30 dependents, change my name, file an amended return, cheat the IRS or lie to the President. I'm a tiny blip on the IRS screen. Or I was. Now my file is sitting on the dining room table of some overworked-underpaid government employee in what is essentially the "slush pile" of the IRS.

But it's okay. I stimulate the economy plenty. And why do I need money? The tuition, books, overwhelming gas payments, they basically pay themselves.


*Wait, amend that, no one is waiting anymore but me.

Which of the seven deadly sins is pride?

Not that it matters.

Let me sit down with you and have a chat. Seriously....come here, next to me, pull up a cushion. We need to talk about grades and about hard work because I learned a few things over the past five months and I want to share them with you.

Comfy? Excellent.

Okay, so as a teacher I know how arbitrary grades are. And they're biased as hell. I give kids breaks left and right, and, while I don't take points away from kids just because I don't like them, I don't do those kids any favors either. The whole grading system is flawed beyond measure......yet it is the only system that "matters" to success for eighteen years of a person's life. There were doors that opened and closed to me based on whether or not the professor a) had had their coffee; b) liked me; c) agreed with my opinion; d) actually graded the stuff or had a TA do it that may or may not have known more than I did. Or many other reasons. As a result, I tend to make sure the overall grade for the student reflects their effort and the work that they completed. I give extra credit. I'm more in favor of hard work than of knowledge. Maybe that makes me unfair, but that's how I am.

So, my point. I finished my last final test tonight, and went home praying I had done enough to not wreck my A. My arbitrary, biased, doesn't-matter A. And I got it. I earned 3 As. With teaching an overload, with a second job at a funeral home, with a dog, with having a life. I earned my first 4.0 ever in my life. And let me tell you---I have never, ever been more proud of myself than I am tonight. Not when I graduated from St. Olaf, not when I got accepted to the Zoetrope: All Story writing conference, not when I was honorable mention in the Mentor Series. This is pride that comes straight from hard work-your-ass-off work, which I've discovered I've done decidedly little of in my life.

I know it's only going to get harder from here. This is the tip of the iceberg, and the further I get into it, the more pressure I'll feel to maintain the 4.0. But I'm focused now in a way that I wish I could share with my students--I wish I could make them see the difference between a B that's handed to them (what I accepted my whole life) and an A that is well earned. The difference is immeasurable.

A secret for you---I wasn't a good student. I look like I would have been, acted like I would have been, but I worked far below my actual ability level. Because I'm lazy. And sloth, also one of those seven deadlys, was a huge downfall for me. I'm not a totally smart person--I'm not a natural A girl, I'm a girl that needs to work for her As. And I never did before this January.

So, I'm basking tonight in a feeling that I've honestly never felt before---total and complete pride in a job truly well done. I know I did my best, and I was rewarded for it. Am I placing too much emphasis on grades? Absolutely. But, well, sometimes it's okay to do that.

Ravenous

I'm absolutely starving. All the time. I'm doing that whole Meredith Baxter Birney-Lifetime movie-bulimia thing without the purging. I can only blame it on the fact that I've removed meat from my diet and therefore my body is always in want of the one thing it can't have. But, if I told you everything I ate today you'd hurl on your shoes.

So, what to do? Continue eating like a state fair hog and gain 30 lbs? Eat meat? (Isn't there a short story about a person whose hunger can never be satiated? I think there's meat involved there too.) Starve myself? Rest assured, I'm not losing any weight.

I think I may need to trot over to Whole Foods and find some good meat substitutes. I'm a little afraid to go in there, but it's either that or continue nibbling away at vegetables and fruits like a vegetarian Rainman until I eventually explode and go out and kill myself a steer.

Okay...going to make some popcorn.

Huh...this pressure cooker thingy has a lid...

Last night I took my bio final. I won't speak of it beyond that I only needed seven points to hold an A in the class (50 point test) and I'm really hopeful (but not positive) that I got seven right. I have my accounting final on Tuesday and my Death and Dying final on Wednesday and then I'm done.

And a funny thing happened when I woke up this morning. At 1pm. The sac of stress I've been floating in since January broke open during the night and I felt a level of calm that I don't remember feeling in months. I definitely prefer to work harder during the term so that finals don't matter quite as much (opposed to the girl in my bio class who didn't even show up for the final because there's no way she can get a C in the class even with a perfect score so she has to retake the class anyway).

Today is my day to sit and enjoy. To read my book. Practice yoga. Play games on the computer. Yeah, I need to clean and do laundry too, but that's cool, I can do that. Later I'll go to the grocery store and get some beans, mushrooms, veggies, to match up with my new food plan. I'm excited for today.

In a tad more than three weeks I start the summer term: cellular biology and intermediate algebra. I have bio for 14 hours a week. Yeech. The learning for that class will be intense: both fast and hard. But, I can do it. In three weeks.

"Mary Moo--oo--oon, she's a vegetarian"

So I'm on day whatever of being a vegetarian. Or, rather, I should say I'm on day whatever of not eating meat. I don't really consider myself a vegetarian because I'm guessing this phase will pass eventually....as soon as the memory of the uncanny resemblance between chicken and rat fades away.

But do you know what I miss? Bacon. I miss bacon. It doesn't appeal to me--like I can't imagine eating it--but I miss it all the same. I miss the crunchy greasy fattiness of it. Somehow tofu doesn't have the same appeal.

Meltdown #618

When I spoke of my meltdown last week, I didn't really imagine that I'd have another one quite so quickly. But, well, I guess my freaking out is an hourly occurrence these days. But, last night while I was sitting down doing my accounting and chatting with Jodi about various sundry items, I suddenly flipped out again.

Now when I say 'suddenly,' I mean just that. I mean that like a switch was flipped inside me, 'suddenly' everything was wrong and I was going to fail accounting (well, get a B, which is just as bad) and I couldn't get the problems or the exercises and blah blah blah.

Because Jodi is my friend and knows me well, she didn't bat an eye when I went from normal conversationalist to suicidal bitch. She switched right along with me, complaining about my professor and the stupid exercises and how could I be expected to do work when it's not explained? And that, folks, is a true friend. Sure, she threw Moist Frank in at the end, but it was a well deserved jab.

I've always, to some degree, had the freakout gene. Having classes, though, and being at the break point for stress 24/7 has only exacerbated an already unruly situation.

Chicks will WHAT?

A few weeks ago I went to my high school's production of Grease. I'd never seen the production before (only the movie), but I knew there was a "censored" version that was performed by high schools around the country. Chicks scream, no one gets off their rocks, there are no tits, and the wagon is of the station variety rather than the feline.

So I'm sitting in the auditorium with BFF Erica and the strains of Greased Lightnin' begin. A boy who is yet not old enough to vote sings, "You are supreme, the chicks'll cream" and my mouth drops. I turn to BFF and she whispers "I don't think he was supposed to sing that." At which point I dissolve into giggles and am really glad I'm not the high school musical director.

The next evening I had Saturday Night Live on in the background as I...well, I was probably studying. Christopher Walken, one of my favorite hosts of all time, does a skit of, guess what, a high school performing Grease. Running through the song in his 'Save the Drama Stage' t-shirt, he gets to "chicks'll cream," and he stops the song. "Chicks will WHAT? That's DIRTY."

He then discusses "get off my rocks", and "real pussy wagon" (and disposes of 'greased lightnin' ' itself all on his own) and changes them to something cleaner because, as he says, "If I let you sing that that the school board will put me in a box and push me down a hill."

Who says life doesn't imitate art?