Before I go on, I admit I stole the title for this entry from one of my students’ Walt and Emily stories. She told me her mother gave her the idea for it. Whatever the case, it is not my title, but it is a very good title, and it is deadly accurate, too.

This morning, I drove to Henry County to meet my ex-husband so Sarah could visit her daddy this weekend. I’d say I was about a mile or a half mile from the I-75 exit which is home to the Chick-Fil-A where we usually meet. The check engine light on the car started blinking. That’s odd, I thought. Then the car started lurching. Okay, stay calm. Why does this shit always happen when I am driving and have at least one kid with me? Thank goodness I didn’t bring Maggie along, or I don’t think I’d be in one piece right now.

I managed to make it to the exit and pull into the Chick-Fil-A. The car died right there in the parking lot. I couldn’t get it to start again. My ex helped me get it into a parking spot. I called a tow truck. Then I tried to call Steve, but my cell phone died. Great. That was the number I gave the towing service. I called them back using my ex’s phone so I could let them know what happened to my phone.

We all went inside the Chick-Fil-A and waited for the tow truck. It arrived about an hour later. The tow truck driver was a Bubba if I’ve ever seen one. Large round belly. Worn out overalls. Thick country accent. He talked my ear off the whole way to the repair shop. He wandered dangerously into other lanes, earning at least one honk from another motorist before he finally hit someone. We waited what seemed like forever for the whole accident report deal. At least no one was hurt. He chatted with me about his court date and all that mess — didn’t want to hear it — and we managed to make it in one piece to the repair shop.

The mechanics couldn’t look at it for a few hours (can they ever?), so Dylan and I — I forgot to make it clear Dylan was still with me — hopped on the bus and went home. Not too long ago, the mechanic called and told us we need a new engine to the tune of $2000-3000, which is probably more than the car is worth.

So I have to try to convince someone to sell me a car this glorious holiday weekend. Bleh. I hate being poor, and I hate having bad credit.

Please let me remind readers old and new that I consider myself a Christian. However, I think Christ must weep daily over the atrocities done in His name. What I am about to relate isn’t exactly an atrocity… or is it?

I was barely awake and listening to talk radio, left on by my husband after he fell asleep the night before. I can’t even recall who the host was, but he was talking about this.

Now, to me, this a prime example of how reactionary the Religious Right is. Anyone tries to be least bit inclusive and all of a sudden our country is going to hell in a handbasket, and secular humanism is taking over. Pretty soon, it’ll be like the days when Christians were thrown to the lions. What they lack is perspective. For the short time I have taught at a Jewish school, one thing I have learned is how dominant and omnipresent Christianity is in our culture. Of course, I speak from the perspective of someone who lives in the South — specifically in Georgia. I really don’t think Christianity is currently in any danger of being subverted.

The talk show host ranted especially about Kwanzaa, citing all the usual objections: the holiday’s creator did prison time; it detracts from Christmas since it’s so close; it isn’t an African holiday at all; it’s an invented holiday. Blah. Blah. Blah. I guess one could say most of those things are true, but so what? Why was he so threatened by Kwanzaa? No one is forcing him to celebrate it or even to accept it as legitimate. Kwanzaa matters to those who celebrate it; to those who don’t — who cares? Why should it bother you that it exists? Kwanzaa is no threat to any religious holiday, because it isn’t religious.

Slaves brought over from Africa were made to convert to Christianity by their Christian masters. Over time, their culture became entwined with that of the slaveholders to create African American culture. What is so threatening, as I said, and to extend that, what is so wrong with wanting to embrace parts of your culture stolen from you? Or even to marry the cultures and create something new?

First of all, yes, the holiday’s creator spent time in prison for assault. Because of that, the holiday is bogus? I don’t understand this argument, because it seems to insinuate that in order to create something, you need to be without blemish — perfect or pure. Who says?

Second, yes, it is close to Christmas. But there seems to be a pretty good explanation for that.

Third, Kwanzaa is not an African holiday, but some of the principles incorporated into the celebration are African, and it embraces African roots. I think the idea is to make something distinctive that means something to African Americans, who are disconnected and removed from their antecedents in Africa. Again, is there something wrong with trying to connect with that past?

Finally, “it’s an invented holiday” is the weakest argument, because every holiday was invented at some point in the past. Christmas, for example, is most likely nowhere near the time when Christ was actually born. It does coincide closely with the Winter Solstice, which was celebrated by many different cultures. Rather than suppress the “pagan” celebrations, Pope Gregory I did something very politically astute: he encouraged Christian missionaries to incorporate those celebrations into Christianity. Christmas was born. It has been in Christian theocracies, such as Puritan New England, where Christmas has been suppressed. Surprising, no? Our staunchest Christians in the past — so devout that they devised a government that would be a shining city on a hill, a beacon to light the world and show the world the way, a government with God at the center — should suppress celebration of the birth of their Savior? Why? Because they recognized it as pagan, that’s why. It should logically follow, then, that if you are truly a fundamentalist, devout Christian, then you shouldn’t celebrate such a pagan holiday as Christmas. If what I just said sounds absurd to you, then maybe you’re starting to understand my point.

I suppose I’m talking about more than Kwanzaa here. I suppose I’m taking about Christmas, Hanukkah, the Winter Solstice, and maybe even Boxing Day and Hogmanay. Or Twefth Night. Or whatever. I’m talking about the fact that there are groups out there so threatened by the idea that holidays besides Christmas be acknowledged that they are taking out ads encouraging Christians not to shop at stores that have signs declaring “Season’s Greetings” instead of “Merry Christmas.” One of my few holiday cards this year was sent to me by a Jew — a rabbi, as a matter of fact. She honored my holiday by sending me a card a few days before Christmas. Why can I not honor her holiday by simply acknowledging it in the form of greeting I use during the holidays?

The end of the WSBTV article was chilling to me:

But to many, the threats and demands that stores put up “Merry Christmas” signs are no laughing matter.

“Why not simply require stores owned by Jews to put a gold star in their ads and on their storefronts?” the Rev. Jim Melnyk, associate rector of St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Raleigh, wrote in a letter to the editor.

That was how it started once before…

One more day of work and we have two weeks off. I am going to miss my students. I was working on these handouts I give out at the beginning of a “unit” today — I call them “minisyllabi.” They’re kind of cute. Bascially, their purpose is to list the works of literature we’ll study, literary terms they’ll learn or review, major assignments, and recommended literature for extension. Yeah, that last bit is kind of “way out there.” I’d be surprised if my students ever actually decided to read one of those books I put on that list. I do it just in case there is another Dana in my class — someone who is quiet, who might not participate much in class discussion — but someone who might actually want teacher recommendations.

I went through this phase in high school when I determined I was going to read every book I needed to read to prepare for college. It started well. I tried to read Agamemnon, but it wasn’t the best introduction to Greek epics — why didn’t my teachers ever have me read The Odyssey? Or even The Iliad? I have come to the conclusion that until I moved to Georgia, I had the crappiest English teachers (generally speaking). I can’t remember doing a single thing in my tenth grade English class except busy seat work. I don’t remember reading a single work of literature that year. My 11th grade teacher was different. I do remember reading “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” in her class, because I remember having to write a sermon. It was an assignment I agonized over, having never yet been to church at that point in my life. I asked my 11th grade English teacher for a list of recommended reading before I moved to Georgia. She gave me a box full of discarded paperbacks instead. There were selections from Twain and Dickens in that box. I was really grateful. I was kind of weird, I guess, but I had it in mind that if I hadn’t read certain books before college, I’d be lost, and all the other students would be ahead of me — I’d never be able to follow class discussions. I found this antiquated book in the library after I had moved. It listed recommended reading for students looking to prepare for college. Like I said, I stalled at Agamemnon. Not a good start. I recall that I tried to read Crime and Punishment, too.

So for any kids I teach who might be as weird as I was, I compile a list of recommended reading related to the literature units we cover.

I had already compiled a “Civil War, Civil Rights” unit handout, which I tweaked with a new font. I made one for “Regionalism, Realism, and Naturalism,” during the course of which, I discovered the husband of my American Realism and Naturalism professor in college has edited a new(?) collection of Realism and Naturalism for Penguin. Remarking upon this to my husband, I was told (in a rather unimpressed, offhand tone, I might add) that I had been “touched by near fame.” Yeah. Whatever. Butthead.

I rounded out the collection with handouts for “Modernism,” “The Harlem Renaissance,” and “Flannery O’Connor and William Faulkner.” I didn’t complete them, really — just the list of works we’ll study. I still need to round out the parts about literary terms and assignments. But they look spiffy. Pretty fonts and pictures. I sure do spend a lot of time on handouts my students probably don’t use or bother to look at even once after I give them out. Oh well. No one can accuse of me of not trying to give them an education — which is something that definitely could be said of good old Mrs. Boyd in the 10th grade.

I bought kosher Star of David cookies at Kroger at 2/3 off since Hanukkah is over. I figured it might be a nice send-off for my colleagues at school. So one more day. Sparker and I have to compose a letter. I need to give my principal grades for some students. I need to verify grades (actually, I don’t need to do that until January 3, by why wait if they’re ready?). I need to clean off my desk. I don’t know how Sparker shares a classroom with me.

I really am going to miss my students. I usually really look forward to breaks. I need the rest, I guess. Well, no, I really do. No guessing about it. Still…

I guess sometimes I take stock and wonder why I keep at this journaling/blogging thing. Something makes me go. I haven’t felt much inspiration lately. Actually, I’ve been avoiding this screen a little. Just a little. But Steve said this:

Writing is hard work. People who don’t even try to write, I think, cannot understand this. You know whatever it is, it’s in there, and you can get it out, if you just keep plugging away. But it can be tiring, and frustrating, and defeat you if you let it.

That, I can understand. I guess I think if I keep plugging away, I’ll get it all out. I think my writing has improved with practice. It’s more natural, flows better. I have been feeling the itch to write something. Fiction. Another book. Find a publishing home for my first book, while I’m at it. But what? Ideas? Not yet. Time? Forget it. So this is my outlet. And sometimes I can’t bring myself to write anything worth reading here. It is very tiring and frustrating. I feel like I’m sinking under it, and I don’t know if I should continue to fight — to write.

And of course, this comes as I am accomplishing things with my writing at work: an article about my class’s incorporation of cheshbon hanefesh into the English curriculum with a study of Ben Franklin (pdf file, uncredited but written by me) or an outline of the differences between college prep and honors English at our school.

I’m going to bed. Lots of parent/teacher conferences tomorrow. I don’t know why I’m having so many. I am dreading it. I want to communicate with parents, but I would feel better knowing where they are coming from. If that even makes sense.