Public Education - Part 2

Read this article in the New York Times today. Many school districts are now offering bonus incentives to attract and retain good teachers, especially in the maths and sciences. Why is it so odd that this is happening? Education needs to be on par with the business world. You can't expect people to work so hard at such an important job for so little pay. It's about time teachers started getting rewarded for staying in tougher schools. They get paid less than their counterparts in wealthier suburban areas and they work five times as hard (if they are any good). Some districts are also paying additional bonuses if performance levels increase. Why is that an anomaly? People in the business world get performance-based bonuses all the time. I hope this is a trend that continues and that perhaps if enough scores and grades go up, governments will realize that this is a model that works and that schools need to be given the money to sustain these programs. It would be interesting for someone to begin a long-term study to determine if crime/incarceration/unemployment go down in the districts where the quality of the teachers improves.

I'm glad I'm not...

...an entertainment reporter. What a horrible, vacuous, sniveling job. Some people may say being in the entertainment industry at all is useless, self-consuming and ridiculous, but at least actors/singers/directors/etc entertain people and possibly, if they are very good and very lucky, also make a difference in peoples lives via their art form. But entertainment reporters? All they do is talk about what people are wearing, who they are sleeping with and then slobber all over them when they interview them. What an awful, awful life. I would hate myself if that were my job.

Maybe all I need is a shot in the arm

Got to revisit the old me for a couple of hours last night. Rich and I went to see Wilco play at Marymoor Park, a beautiful park in Redmond, a suburb of Seattle better known as home to a certain software mega-company. I don't just love Wilco, I LOVE Wilco. There is something about Jeff Tweedy that gets me. It's not a physical crush; try as I might, I'm not physically attracted to him. But Lord Almighty, as soon as that man opens his mouth to sing I am enraptured. His voice is just so plaintive and his lyrics so funny/earnest/true. Maybe it's because Wilco nursed me through the biggest heartbreak of my life. Jeff Tweedy has clearly explored the height and depth, light and dark, sighs, moans and aches of love. So, if you've have ever experienced any of it yourself, there is a Wilco song for you. I don't want to sleep with Jeff Tweedy, but I want him to be my next door neighbor that comes over for cookouts all the time.

Driving to the concert I was still in mom-bot mode a bit. We'd left Theo asleep with some friends at our apartment but it wasn't until we were approaching the venue that suddenly I got that familiar pang of excitement, the rush of going to see one of my favorite bands live and knowing that for a couple of hours, if all goes well - and there isn't some asshole frat boy smoking pot or trying to mosh in front of me or some drunk hippie chick flailing her arms around in a dance trance - I will be able to stand there letting the vibrations of my favorite songs pulsate through my body. I will be witness to some witty banter that I can pretend isn't the same witty banter from the night before or the night after. I'm not good company at concerts - Rich can attest to that. If it's a band I really love, I treat it like a religious experience. I don't like to talk during a concert. I don't go get beer during the band's set. I mouth words but I don't sing out loud and I hate it when people around me do - I paid to hear the band, not you, asshole. If it's a song that requires quiet, I silently plead with the people around me to understand and be respectful of the words and music being shared at that moment. Some of my favorite concert moments are when there is a shared crowd mentality that we are all in the presence of greatness and the crowd goes quiet, carefully listening to what our hero/heroine has to say. There were one or two instances of that last night. And, of course, there were also the frat boys in full regalia- beer, pot, cigarettes and baseball hats (please God, please don't let them be driving home the same direction as Rich and me).

So, for a couple of hours last night I tapped into my youthful, concert-going self. I don't get to see nearly as many concerts as I used to pre-baby. It's a habit I don't want to drop and last night reminded me of that.

I'm back

Whew. I'm back if you'll have me. It's mid-August. I haven't written in almost 3 months. I'm embarrassed, I feel like a slacker but, in some ways, I also don't care all that much. I started this blog to keep people informed on what it going on in my life and quite frankly, I think my absence says more than my words can. Theo is 10 months old, crawling like a fiend, pulling himself up, talking (albeit in a language only he understands), eating bigger chunks of food and still not sleeping all that great. We have a routine each day and sometimes, in those precious couple of hours I get to myself during the day, I just don't want to blog. I often think in blog. I have good intentions. I think to myself, "I am going to blog about this today" but it just doesn't happen.

We have traveled a lot this summer. We went to Cape Cod in June to stay at our friend Dylan's family's house. We were there for a week. It was great to be away. The beach was warm, the water was freezing. I was paranoid that Theo would get eaten alive by mosquitoes, sucked on by a tick or covered in poison ivy. None of it happened but all the possibilities made it slightly less relaxing than I had imagined. I also learned an important lesson that week: "vacation" is redefined when you become a parent. You are off routine, you don't have access to everything you may need, you aren't in control of your surroundings and, in our case, Theo doesn't sleep well outside of his own crib. "Vacation" isn't a relaxing word anymore. It means making sure I don't forget important things and bracing myself for even less sleep.

After the Cape we were home for a few weeks before Rich took off for a conference in Vienna and I took Theo to visit my mom in Jacksonville. I couldn't bare the thought of being alone in the sweltering city for nearly 10 days so I ran home to Mom's house where I could rely on doting family and friends. I was not let down. My mom was up with us at 6:30 every morning, she came in to see if she could help the nights Theo was awake at 2am, we saw my Aunt Jane and her family who were visiting from England, Jenny drove up from Orlando to see us and my brother Jeremy hung out with us a lot. It was a great trip that culminated in two canceled flights and finally arriving home in NYC a day late and at 1:30am with a very sleepy, but incredibly patient little man.

A week after arriving home from FL we flew to ATL for our friend Nick's wedding. So good to be there but my Lord, we spent a ton of money getting there, the weekend flew by and I missed most of the ceremony and reception taking care of Theo who was not going to sit through an entire Catholic mass, missed a proper afternoon nap and therefore desperately needed to go back to the hotel room to go to bed.

Four days after returning from ATL, we were on a plane again, this time to Seattle where we are right now. It is great to be back. We are here for 3 weeks (already been here for one) while Rich works. I have been rediscovering this city as a parent. Theo and I have been to the zoo, the aquarium, several new playgrounds, the Pacific Science Center and on a harbor cruise. There are still more playgrounds to track down, there is Pike Place Market and the Children's Museum. I think we'll stay occupied pretty well for the rest of our trip. I have been entertaining delightful fantasies of moving back, buying a Craftsman home somewhere in Central Seattle (hello, fantasy - can't do that for less than a cool half mil these days), teaching for The Seattle Children's Theatre and happily volunteering for KEXP all the time.

So, that's where I've been the last few months. Right now, Rich is out having a boy's night out and so I realized it was a perfect time to catch up on my blog. I don't know if any of you still check in anymore, but I will hopefully keep writing so that the next time you do you will be pleasantly surprised.