Dragnet Report

The poet Mary Oliver described writing as waking up in the morning and the world saying: “Here I am. Would you like to make a comment?” Most people say, “No, thank you. I’m busy.” The writer says, “I believe I do.”

And so 8 years and over 2500 blogposts later, it has been my habit to make comments. Yet my last post was November 20—seven days of blog silence. What’s going on?

In short, life. I’m 100% aware that the world went on just fine without my comments and I was okay as well. But I did miss those moments of reflection and the invitation to enlarge the experiences just a bit more through giving it some sense of meaning through language. And that Kilroy sense of  “I was here. This is what happened and it mattered.”

But life is still overshadowing reflection with the grandchildren visiting and their constant demand for attention. So in this rare moment when Malik is fingerpainting in the basement with his grandma and Zadie is entertaining herself with kazoo melodies, I’m at least going to try to remember what happened last week. In the style of Jack Webb from the old Dragnet TV show: “Just the facts, ma’am.” Low on the adjectives and heavy on the nouns and verbs. As follows:

Wednesday: 11/20/19

Jazz Jeopardy game with the 8^thgraders, off to the airport with James and Sofia, arrive in Salt Lake City for my 38^thOrff National Conference.

Thursday: Morning workshops in Diversity Training, afternoon two workshops that I taught, evening rehearsals with the 38 Middle School kids who arrived to perform at the Conference.

Friday: Morning workshop, sound check with the kids, afternoon performance with them, dinner at Buca di Beppo and bid them farewell.

Saturday: A day of workshops and schmoozing, closing ceremony, banquet and dancing, late night party in a hotel suite playing “Cheers Guv’nor.”

Sunday: Morning of meetings with national Orff teachers, fly to Portland, drive to Grant’s Pass 5 hours with my daughter Kerala and two grandchildren.

Monday: Drive 7 hours to San Francisco, arrive in time for dinner and taking the car to the mechanics. 

Tuesday: Take the grandkids to the playground in cold, cold weather (oop! adjectives!), retreat indoors to play with a friend’s grandchild, film crew at my house to interview me and extended family in this ongoing film project chronicling my work in this last year of school, celebrate my daughter Talia’s 35^thbirthday at her house. 

Wednesday: Here I am and these my Dragnet-style comments. More (hopefully) to come.