10 Oct 06

Time:

23 min, no more or less, to return from the treadmill and be headed out the door.

Money:

$2, a Diet Cherry Vanilla Coke. Yecch.
$12, the typical salad PLUS (to be daring) a cup of "Maryland Crab Soup" and a bottle of tea, All About Food.
$7, coffee for Anne and me, campus Starbucks.
$1, gum to ward off the scallion breath, which turned out to be a good plan, campus market thingy (very cool; I'll have to go back.)
$12, surprisingly good "vegetable don" (otherwise known as stir-fried veggies and brown rice), Dojo.
$3, Egg Beaters for tomorrow and the next day, Gristede's.

More interesting things:

Followed, for what must be a series of unrelated reasons, a trail of sweetener packets throughout the gym. It started with some highly incongruous Sweet 'n' Lows in the locker room and moved on to a Splenda in the gym lobby. Did the same person drop them all? Why did she (because it was, remember, in the women's locker room that I spied the pink packets) have a pocket full of fake sugar? Was there a caterer in the gym as had been, judging by the stack of bagel boxes, in the lobby? Does somebody think she's going to satisfy the runner's need for carbohydrate by snorking this stuff? (I hope not, or if she does I hope she's not a nutrition major, since of course the whole point of these things is that they have no calories.)

Minded my own business almost all the way down University Place, but I could not ignore the battalion of movie production trucks starting about in front of Space Market and stretching on down to Washington Place and well around the corner. A doorman told me that it was not just a real movie - I Am Legend, or something - but one featuring Will Smith, for chrissakes. And that is what I find merely by walking to school. First dachshunds, now this... I dare any other town to try to keep up.

Added to the pleasant weirdness by noting that one of the light trucks came from Port Washington. We are not talking bustling metropolis here; it's more on the level of contentedly-moseying beach town. And yet it not only supports what must be a reasonably formidable technical lighting company but happened to send one of its trucks right into my AO today. Nice.

Watched a hired (water) gun as he attended to the plants - I didn't know they were real, but I probably could have guessed - in the bottom of Pless. Somehow this gave me a subtle sense of satisfaction, as if an obscure but quietly niggling question had at last been answered, which I guess it has.

Thanked the Starbucks Line Commander as he carefully relayed our orders to whatever lieutenant was listening to the other end of his microphone system and got a "have a nice day, sweetie" in return. As Anne says, that comment in a condescending tone is entirely insupportable, but this was just nice, and I appreciated it.

Came across Professor... oh, this one doesn't have a code name, which is dumb because she should be Professor Alpha-and-a-Half, fitting in between (of course) Alpha and Bravo. In any case, I happened to be grinning about something - I wish I could remember what - when I met her on my way to get some gum. I said "hi," obviously, and got a lovely collection about "good to see you" and "nice to see your smiling face" in return. This is cool, because Alpha-and-a-Half was one of the first ones to confirm my suspicion about the distinctive, unrestrained, and usually delightful personalities around here, and I'm always glad to see her.

Caught - as has been my fortunate and recently onion-free custom in the last few weeks - Professor Alpha himself. He made the usual comment about "there she is!", to which I responded with my usual comment about how fortunate that made us all - but this time, I got first a loud and growly agreement ("Yes, I think about how lucky I am EVERY DAY!") followed by a high-five that somehow turned into a hug. (Not that I'm going to argue.) I told him very unspecifically about my meeting with Professor Bravo, was told that I have to TAKE the opportunity to comment or else I would never get it, came back to that by reminding him that I had to take at least ONE meeting to figure out what was going on, and was consequently reminded that I "already know what's going on - you taught! You know how the chemistry teacher blames YOU because the kids can't read!" (Whereupon I got whacked once more in the shoulder.)

Caught Alpha once again, this time on his way to class, causing me to query very intelligently, "On your way to class? [Duh.] See, now your students are the lucky ones." "Well, yes, they're a bunch of lucky ducks. And you will be too, next semester." "Wait, me? What?" (A fine example of my conversational ability.) "Yes, you - you're going to take Seminar in College Teaching with me next semester." "Hey, cool - that is lucky!" And out he went. Thankfully, so I didn't have to try to compose any more illuminating sentences.

Slid very casually into a conversation with Professor Number One (that she started, by the way!) about my teaching prospects for next semester - she does want me to take the course, which of course led to a small discussion of what I'm doing now. Reminders about the grant work followed, and then a backed-off mention of the articles Professor Bravo asked me to read. The response wasn't particularly interesting until the part where I hoped it would become so, when I added that they were newspaper articles; here Professor Number One came in like a champ. I didn't have to clarify anything, because it was obvious she already thought that was weird, but somehow we made it to the issue of Professor Bravo not having any idea (I didn't add that he doesn't seem to care) about what I've studied, what my interests are, or, apparently, whether he could expect me to have kept up with current events in education over the past few years. She suggested handing him my resume, so I sort of rhetorically mentioned that of course Bravo was just being hired right about the time my classmates and I were being picked from the barrel and so hadn't seen my portfolio, and I got the ideal answer: "Oh, of course! The portfolio! That would be much easier, wouldn't it? You could let him see how you got here in the first place!" She told me that either Professor Alpha or Number Four would have it, and that it shouldn't be a problem at all for me to ask one of them about it. What are we going to do without Number One?

Found yet another reason to appreciate Professor Number One when she engaged thoughtfully, thoroughly, and authentically in the "Channel the Spirit of Louise Rosenblatt" activity my partner had come up with. She worked with Marisa of the ed theatre background, and combining that with her personal knowledge of Dr. Rosenblatt - she WAS a Mrs., I overheard, but Ratner, not Rosenblatt, and heaven help you if you skipped the "Dr." - made for a genuinely awesome performance.

Reminded Number One that we would really miss her, as no one else has quite the sense of history that she does. Even if, as she says, history is not politically timely at the moment, someone has to keep track of it, and she's the one who's done it so far.

Sensed, throughout all these exchanges, that the air of familiarity is coming in pretty big chunks. I wondered about that before I got here, knowing full well how lucky I was to have had it at Florida, and I'm glad it's already starting to grow in.

Crossed Broadway near the garage on my way back to the train and examined, with the woman standing next to me, a big brass-looking circular thing marked with four raised letters, two of which were N-Y, resting on the subway grate. She said that she passed it every day, and that it looked to her like a Christmas tree stand. I thought it seemed more like a flag stand, and hefted it up just a little to check if it was attached (it wasn't), but either way it was cool to share that experience. Humanity in New York, it seems, is beaten out only by politeness as an ostensibly surprising but very real factor of life in the city, but I guess those do kind of go together.