The rumors of my disappearance from the face of the Earth have been highly exaggerated. But it's certainly true, and rather surprising for me to realize, that I haven't stopped to write here at all so far this month. So let me remedy that lapse immediately, now that I actually have a few minutes to breathe.In the past few weeks, I held my graduation party, which was the best party (if I may say so myself) that I've been to in a while. My wonderful advisor came and I got a chance to celebrate the Ph.D. with my incredibly nice colleagues. My husband gave a very moving toast and everyone had a nice time. We came home with loads of leftover food from the caterer, who prepared delicious hors d'oeuvres and had nicely decorated the rooms in one of the old houses of my small college on the hill where we gathered.
The first three weeks of classes have gone by in a blur, and I'm still playing catch-up with my preparation although I'm learning to strive for less perfection and leave more in the hands of my students. I have two strong groups and I'm having a lot of fun each time we meet, and while I'm doing a lot more grading because I'm trying a new approach that has them writing a 2-page response paper for each class (which translates into more than 50 pages of writing through the semester), I'm reading a lot more quality material because they're being thoughtful and thorough in their comments about the readings.
Last Saturday was apportioned to an annual checkup and some shopping with Dr. S and my new colleague-friend in Drama, Ms. M, so this was the first Saturday back to the farmer's market, also with Dr. S. She was kind enough to take the picture above for me so I could finally post today and dispel any fears that I've fallen off the edge of the world, or forgotten my little space here.
Also today, Dr. S helped me to buy some fabric for my quilting class, which started last Wednesday. This coming Wednesday we will start cutting fabric and I'll re-learn to operate the sewing machine. My loving abuela, the same one who now lies demented, talking nonsense to the dead, and slowly shriveling on her death bed, was an accomplished seamstress and had me take sewing classes eons ago. Young girl that I was, I didn't pay much attention, sewed a terribly distorted dress that got tossed into the garbage , and I gave up on the attempt. The best I've ever been able to do is hem and I'm not even very good at that (although I mostly use a simple basting stitch) so I'm not too optimistic of what will come out of this quilting endeavor.
But I want to do this quilting for my abuela, who even though she herself never quilted, did try to instill in me a love for detailed, manual work, something I've never had the attention span or patience to cultivate. In her honor, I'm going to try, and if I get to make the quilt, I'll post a picture here so you all can see it. At least I picked what I think are really cool fabrics with the help of Dr. S and the kindly ladies at the quilting shop in town.
At the farmer's market today we stocked up on fresh veggies even when there were much fewer stands because of the pelting rains that we've been having in these parts recently. Still, I got my locally made sharp cheddar cheese, some lima beans for my husband, and some onions and sweet peppers to make a home-made sofrito.
Tomorrow, I have invited two first-year students to dinner here and I'm thinking of making the fried chicken again. That means that I'd better get my ass in gear now so I can go buy the locally grown chicken and the locally produced buttermilk and get the fresh peaches for my fifth? cobbler of the summer.
As Dr. S's lovely picture shows, however, summer is ending because the fat pumpkins are singing. This weekend is summer's last hooray, as my husband pointed out. It was a good, if kind of crazy busy, summer. Long live summer, indeed!
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