A knitting problem?

Yesterday, someone introduced me then explained, "you'll know her because she's ALWAYS knitting."

True. Very true. I love the peace, calm, and meditative aspects of knitting. And I loathe waiting, long meetings, consensus-building discussions, adult team-making games, and intermissions. So I knit.

I also knit to keep my mouth shut. Somehow knitting squelches the urge to interrupt or opine needlessly.

I have edited some of the places where I used to knit. No more restaurants. Or carpool. Or the church pew. Though if my family keeps focusing on smart phones rather than conversation, I may have to revert to that previously embarrassing-to-them public behavior.

I am a knitter ... much more relaxed than anyone around me regardless the tedium or tumult.

10-10-10

Now I know how to read a bag of fertilizer. (Experienced gardeners, go ahead and snicker.) The vastness of my ignorance was the catalyst for applying to the DeKalb County Extension Office's Master Gardener program. My yard and vegetable garden are testament to the trial and error approach that has resulted in more errors than I can count.

One class and I decided:

1. I need a tiller. Because unless I'm going to landscape the yard in raised beds the whole thing needs churning and turning.

2. Learning soil science in two and a half hours is like drinking from a fire hose.

3. Pressure cookers have come a long way since my grandmother's day when explosions were a real threat.  (I got that gem from a lifetime canner/preserver who lives on a family farm. She could TEACH the master gardener program but thought she still has much to learn so she signed up.)

During class, I ignored the edict to turn off my cell phone (it's never off since my kids have to be able to reach me in an emergency) and instead silenced it and set it next to my iPad.

While we have lost much of the intrinsic lore related to self-reliant vegetable gardening (my grandparents KNEW when to plant, where to plant, when to harvest, how to can/preserve, and how to enrich soil without chemicals ...) we have gained amazing tools giving us access to a plethora of knowledge via the internet.

When the Soil Science Master opined on chemicals to balance alkalinity and acidity for various plants, I consulted an organic gardening website to see the alternative methods available because I prefer a more "natural" approach.  I snapped photos  of graphs and data I couldn't transcribe quickly or neatly enough with note-taking or the Penultimate app. I looked up a gardening book recommended by another intern and ordered it with my one-click account on Amazon.  And I used one of the breaks to review flash card apps I'll utilize to master the vocabulary and concepts I need to know to pass the final exam (it's a certification program).

The only thing my electronic tools couldn't do was prevent the mid-afternoon sleepy slump that unfortunately coincided with the basic botany lesson. Note to self: extra Diet Coke in the lunch bag for that post-prandial lull.

My bucket list has a new check for "Learn something new every year."  The Master Gardener class is intellectually stimulating, evocative, and physically challenging (thanks to the 50 required volunteer service hours in the field), so it's a great foundation for 2012.

When your college student comes home ...

I've heard many, many stories about the give and take required to live peacefully during winter and summer breaks with college students more accustomed to making their own decisions than following their parents' lead.

I get it. Fortunately for me, and in spite of my overachieving ways, my son is too innately kind and tolerant to remind me that he's already demonstrated the ability to take care of himself, thank you very much.

College Guy stumbled downstairs this morning to let the dog out and get some breakfast. I've been up for awhile and am in full "morning person" mode. He's bleary-eyed, appalled at rising before noon during a break from school, and absolutely not tuned in.

Me:  "Good morning! We're going to Stone Mountain today. Want to come? Did you bring your dirty clothes downstairs? Because I have a load going into the washing machine shortly and you can add yours if you want. Did that computer science class open up yet? I'm trying to decide about dinner tonight so let me know if you have a preference."

College Guy: "Wait ......................... What?"

Poor guy. Even as a toddler, he was slow to get going in the mornings. The difference was that I could just pick him up, toss him into the car seat, and head out while he stared vacantly out the window.

I have no idea how he gets himself up at school ... I'm just glad he does. He kept up with his medicine and his appointments, managed not to lose too much weight because he didn't want to bother going to the dining hall or grocery store, didn't lose his laptop or his cell phone, discovered that drying his beloved cargo pants takes twice as long as any other load, caught up after missing a week of school when he was hospitalized with an intestinal blockage, ate nothing but junk food and the occasional pear, went hiking at midnight with roommates "just because," celebrated his birthday with campus friends, saw first-hand what "stupid drunk" really means, and kept his grades up.

Yay for that critical first Freshman semester DONE.

For College Guy's birthday, I shipped a box full of party gear, including moustaches, a crown, pin the tail on the donkey game, party hats and blowers, glow in the dark necklaces, and candy. Goofy stuff. We had pizza delivered to his dorm, timed for the end of finals for the day. Evidently the moustaches were a particular hit with the girls, all of whom wore one for the duration.

Raking in the fall.

I love fall weather. I love the glorious blue skies, crispness in the air, swirling leaves, and disappearance of gnats, mosquitoes, and flies.

Raking those swirling leaves, however, brings out my inner procrastinator. While my neighbors industriously rake those leaves onto tarps and bag them into 30+ brown sacks each week or landscape crews make quick work of the chore with their major-league blowers, I stare gloomily at the rising tide and think of lots of other things I need to do instead.

I'm not alone. Evidently, a lot of people try to come up with ways to make the chore easier, or at least more interesting.

I have wide rakes and hand rakes; bag-hold-em-openers and a wet vac that supposedly will suck up leaves (not); High School Girl, College Guy (occasionally), and Campaign Guy to join me in the "fun" and  an electric blower to help move the mass onto huge tarps.

I sure miss the weekly leaf pick-up where we lived in North Carolina - you just blew and raked everything to the curb and a single truck would vacuum everything up.

A human-powered alternative to those smelly, loud gas-powered backpack blowers blaring across Dunwoody throughout the fall.

No matter what I try, I'm still raking leaves every week through Christmas. When I order pine straw from DHS' Cross Country team, it's knowing I'll have to store it until all the leaves are off the trees. The Troop 764 Boy Scout pine straw sale falls nicely in the spring to cover the comingled leaves and pine straw left after winter storms drive the remaining leaves down from the trees.

Okay, enough whining about the leaves. The yard is well covered and needs raking.

After I do the grocery shopping, laundry, and carpool duties. Is it going to rain? I need to wait until the leaves are dry. Wait, I need to bake for the Marching Band end of season cookout. So maybe I should wait until next week.

Yes, you can knit. It's easy. Really.

I highly recommend this video for those who want to learn to knit:

"We're not making mistakes. We're making experiences."

"Come on, man. Just buy a scarf."

Sublimely hilarious.

What about the schools?

One of the most critical considerations for anyone moving with a family from one community to another is the quality of the schools. Dunwoody is blessed with great schools that thrive in spite of lackluster central office leadership, strangled budgets, self-protective personnel policies, and education pedagogy that change with the whims of state and county administrations. 

All those woes are well documented in DeKalb County School Watch, a blog that serves as watchdog and gadfly for our local system.  If you're a parent, you should read it. Knowledge is power.

For awhile, there was a grassroots effort underway to consider turning Dunwoody High School and all its feeder schools into a single Charter Cluster. I don't know if the steam has run out of that effort, if the folks engaged in the foundational work have turned to other issues, or where things stand today, but I hope the concept finds new energy in the near future.  Fulton County Schools are considering charter status, one of many school systems and clusters willing to tackle the massive documentation, research, and development work required to satisfy the state's evolving requirements.

DeKalb Schools has a new superintendent. Maybe she's a rainmaker and something good will finally come out of that dysfunctional nexus. We have an outstanding School Board representative in Nancy Jester, who is often the lone voice of pragmatism in a group of people who seem to add to our problems rather than solve them. Georgia is requesting a waiver from the illogical No Child Left Behind paradigm and trying on yet another measurement tool that ignores the realities of student capabilities and inconsistent parent support. Our state level elected representatives would have to change state regulations and budget limitations that prevent Dunwoody from having greater control over our schools. There are lots of obstacles (costs are #1) to having our own school system. But there are many, many positives to having our cluster go charter.

By the time the education juggernaut changes direction, my kids will likely no longer be in Dunwoody's public schools. But I'll still be a taxpayer, homeowner, and passionate booster of this community.

Schools are relevant now and for the future.

Sure is early.

It's nearly 7:00 am and the Knitternall family's morning has been underway over an hour. We rise and stumble at 5:30 so High School Girl can catch her bus to the Fernbank Science Tools & Technology program. No complaints from her ... all that science is nirvana to her rationalist soul. (Oh, the philosophical and faithful discussions we have had ...)

Once the fog of sleepwalking in the dark lifts, I'm glad I'm up so early. I'm at my most productive during those brisk hours before mid-afternoon, after which I slide into a stuporous, slow blinking half attention for late afternoon and evening meetings and deadlines (fair warning). One of my clients is at full charge around the time I head to bed, which means she's texting me at a time I can't think straight. We've worked out a system where she sends stuff to me well past midnight, then I tackle them a few hours later. Deadlines met.

Good morning, Dunwoody.

Hello, Mr. Smith, the preternaturally alert and cautious school bus driver who rises at 3 am, makes his rounds in Dunwoody, then delivers his teen-aged passengers safely to Decatur each day.

See you tonight, Campaign Guy, as he leaves for another busy day bridging work and Dunwoody visits. We'll meet again over dinner.

Have a great day, neighbors leaving the house with one hand on the wheel and the other flexing a coffee cup to lips in the dark of the pre-dawn work day.

Sssshhh, lawn care companies starting power mowers and blowers before 9 (actually, at 7:15 one recent morning). I know you have a long day ahead, but please don't break the morning peace so abruptly.

That's enough, Fox News, CNN, and other cable news shows relying way too much yelling at each other rather than the calmer BBC method of simply reporting the news.

I'm on it, much valued client texting a desperate "can you get this by 10 am today" plea for writerly attention.

Just a minute, hyperactive Scooter the Wonder Dog. You don't really need to go to the bathroom - it's that chipmunk family under the front steps you're really keen to check on.

Have a great day!