Good news: looks like Wuthering Heights Community College is going to accept my MTSU lit. crit. class as fulfilling my writing requirement and the missing credit of general English. I am trying really hard not to roll my eyes. I am concentrating on being grateful. I am grateful.
Bad news: the Dean of P.E. said no getting out of the physical education requirement. But I'm not giving up. Linda, my champion from Student Counseling, is checking to see how the Admissions and Transfer Center handle situations like mine versus the letter of the law, i.e., per the catalog. I can't find a Saturday class on the fall schedule, so I'm not sure they really do offer it at a time when I can take it. We might be back to questioning reality.
Good news: Koroshiya and I found cheap tickets to Hawaii a different way and we can confirm them Monday instead of waiting until two weeks before our vacation. It costs a bit more but the hotel and car are free so hey, it works out. I am going primarily because I haven't seen Honolulu since I was 12 and not paying attention to hotels. Besides, I think it's changed a bit. Watching reruns of Magnum P.I. isn't really that helpful. So I'm going on a personal familiarization trip and Koro is keeping me company. John gets to stay home and take care of the pets. He's been to Honolulu more recently than me, anyway.
Yesterday was September 11th. I had no interest in writing about it. Last year I kept abreast of the breaking news by staying on AIM all day talking to Teresa Nielsen Hayden in Brooklyn who saved the sanity of my friend at work, a native New Yorker, by repeatedly phoning her mother until she finally got through and determined she was okay. She refers to this obliquely in her weblog entry, but I am here to tell you it was not a small thing, not to my friend or to me. Teresa's husband, friends and co-workers were in the city. She watched the towers burn from the roof of her apartment. Compassion in the midst of despair, comforting a stranger in the face of unbearable fear, is a huge thing. Not everyone is capable of it. Extreme situations bring out our truest selves, for good or ill. It is entirely typical of Teresa to help others instead of giving in to the agony of suspense and terror.
For this I am profoundly grateful. No concentration necessary.
The Index
Next Incarnation