bionic woman

My mom rocks. She'll do anything for anyone within her power and try even if it's not. She's the kind of mom that will make a great grandma.

So it sucks that life has dealt her the hand it has. Since 1996 she's had countless surguries trying to fix all the crap that's wrong with her body. In the last year alone she's had 5 surgeries. And even with all the cutting, there's things that can't get fixed. Like this condition called Neuropathy that is slowing robbing her of all sensation below the waist. You can stick her foot with a hundred needles and she can't feel it.

Plus there's the two types of arthritis she can't fix either.

And she's only 62.

The lady who directs the children's choir I work with is also 62. And she complains about her aching muscles after her yoga and pilates classes or after her two hour power walk. I want to smack her and tell her to shut up and be grateful she can even feel the aching muscles.

Mom had yet another surgery last week. So after coming home from St. Louis I headed back to take care of her for a couple days.

While I love her to death, she's completely frustrating to try to take care of. She doesn't want anyone to help her.

Even when people are there and offering she refuses the help which leads to more injuries. And she lives in a hundred year old house that wasn't ever meant to be handicap friendly. Not to mention that the house is almost an hour from any family.

I can understand that she's been in the house almost 40 years and doesn't want to leave. It's what she knows. It's what she's comfortable with.

And, honestly, it's the last bastian of what her life used to be: A woman who would take care of herself, her family and her home.

She's only 62, an age when most people are just about to pay off their house and look forward to enjoying that house in a few years when they retire.

But the house isn't paid off because of left-over crap from my dad's bad business deals that fell on my mom's shoulders (beware the co-sign) and she can't retire because she's been forced to go on disability.

Most of the burden has fallen on my sister since she's the closest and most willing to help. I'm sure it pisses her off because I live far away. But no one could have forseen just 12 years ago when I moved away that mom would be where she is now.

I wish there was good news for mom, but there isn't. I just wish she'd take the help being offered, and stop being depressed over her state in life.

Honestly, she needs counseling but refuses to admit she needs it. Damn stubborn independence.

I couldn't stay long in New Baden. There was a conference in Topeka of Choral Directors. I could have skipped it, but I was told by all my new collegues that I needed to go.

Especially since it was right here in Topeka.

All the Lawrence directors were there. I got overwhelmed by the information and the music presented and realized I hadn't read music in the bass clef for over 7 years.

But it was nice, for once, to go to a conference where I wasn't one of, maybe, three guys in a room like at the elementary conferences. And there were no denim jumpers with an "apple" iron-on and no cheesy vests covered with treble clefs.

More than anything, though, the conference felt like a giant pep talk for me.

When I heard about the opening for this job I have now, I wasn't even thinking of going for it. But the other secondary (that's j.h. and h.s. in lay terms) folks were pressuring me to go for it. And the only reason I went for it was because I wondered if I would *ever* have this kind of support at a new job again.

Going into the conference and even at this very moment, I'm not exactly sure how I'm going to do it (and no, I'm not fishing for anymore pep-talking here) I've never taught J.H. Not even student teaching. It's been 8 years since I've had to teach SATB (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) music. But this week they (the Lawrence teachers) all reiterated that "you" are the one to fix this school and that anytime I needed any help of any kind that they would be at my side. It was almost surreal. I've never had this kind of offering of support at either of my last two jobs. But I still wondered if they did this for every new teacher. But I realized they didn't when a straight-talking H.S. teacher told me that I was the only one in that district who could do it. (this is the same teacher I met at Ted and Phil's several years ago.)

I made some awesome contacts. Not least of which is the new director of choral activities at KU. He offered to come in and help me recruit and come in and observe and give me pointers. And then he asked if I would be interested in his new three-summer conducting program at KU where I could get my Master's in choral conducting.

He's only taking 10 students.

Seriously. Surreal.

Friend Ted was right. Life starts at 30.

But tomorrow I head back to St. Louis. Mom, of course, doesn't want me to, but someone needs to be there in case something happens.

So shut-up, mom, and take the damn help.

staycation

Friend Jill has a new word she hates: Webinar.

My new word that I hate: staycation.

I hate it because it's what I've always done because I normally can't afford vacations. I've always joked that I live in our vacation. But that's always been a conscience choice. I'm fully aware that if I spend money in one place, I can't spend it somewhere else. And, frankly, I'm tired of spending it on the house.

But it makes me sad that a lot of Americans are being forced to stay home when they usually don't have to. Almost like the media pundits are saying, "Be good little sheep. Don't raise a ruckus now. Just go with it."

I do, however, get to take mini-vacations to see my mom every once in a while. Though that's gotten more difficult since we figured it costs $200 just to get there and back. And though I love my mom, New Baden is no oasis. Especially for the queer folk. A Google search finds that 0.02% of the households in New Baden are gay or lesbian. And though that translates to around 50 people, they're tough to locate unless they're wearing too much expensive cologne and have freshly highlighted hair.

Trenton, our neighboring town, has 0.00% gay and lesbian households.

Homophobes.

Last week I headed to Big Mama's. I lucked out because it was gay pride in St. Louis last weekend. And, ironically, I ran into one of New Baden's gays at the gas station in New Baden. I didn't know each other nor did I really speak but he was a very very, um, obvious gay.

Then I saw him at pride and pretended I'd never seen him before. I can be pretentious like that.

Lots of people in the gay community look down at Pride saying things like, "Those people don't represent me" or "The people who go to pride are the people who perpetuate the stereotypes about gays and lesbians."

Honestly, both of those statements could be true. If all I did was glance at pride, I wouldn't see many people who look like me. And the pictures of the parades that make it into newspapers usually show drag-queens, men dressed all in leather, and uber-skinny boys in girls' jeans. And I'm none of those things.

Stay awhile at pride and you'd notice lots of couples that look just like us. In fact, I sat next too a couple at the parade that reminded me of us.

But here's what I'm proud of. All those people that you see *in* the parade (the cross-dresser, the leatherfolk) are mirrored in the heterosexual community. Hetero's do just as much freaky shit as the gays. The Hetero's just don't have a parade. I'm proud that gays are out there saying, "Hey, this is who I am. Deal with it." and not hiding it in the bedroom where conservatives would like to keep it.

And just as I'm sure most straight people would agree that the people who join swinger's clubs or like to be stepped on by stilettos don't represent them, I'm sure they wouldn't dare suggest those people shouldn't be allowed to get married just because they enjoy something different from them.

OK, soapbox done.

I've been wanting to get up to Springfield, IL for a while to see all the Lincoln sites. I spent a day touring the *amazing* new Lincoln museum, Lincoln house, Lincoln law office, Old State Capitol and Lincoln Tomb.

For the past several summers I've been to Springfield to volunteer at a camp there. But I'd never gotten to see the sites. I'd seen them on an elementary field trip. But I remember being more concerned with photo-ops than learning anything on that field trip.

I'm a sucker for architecture and history. And I learned some fascinating things about what I saw in Springfield.

1. What you see inside the old state capitol building is only about 40 years old. The original interior (where Lincoln had been a legislator and laid in state) had actually been demolished over a hundred years ago for a building remodel into a courthouse. When the courts moved out, the state once again demolished the interior and put it back the way it was in Lincoln's day.

2. 2/3 of the building that Lincoln had his offices in is now gone. Luckily, the 1/3 that remains is the part in which Lincoln had his law offices. It was the most original of the buildings I saw. It still had the original plaster on the walls and original floors.

3. While the Lincoln home really is the house where Lincoln lived, very little of what you see today is original to Lincoln's time. Over the last 140 years, most of the siding has been replaced, the walls replastered, the wall paper recreated, the floors replaced and reinforced with steel (almost 250,000 people walk through the house every year.) and the furnishings approximated. When Lincoln left for Washington, he sold almost everything to a man who moved the furniture to Chicago... where it was destroyed in the great Chicago fire of 1871. The house is in such pristine condition now it looks like a giant doll house.

4. The Lincoln tomb is much grander now than when it was originally built. But it's still shy of what Mary Todd wanted. Mary wanted something larger, more grand, more ornate. But there just wasn't money. Instead of a marble interior, they had to use sandstone. Bronze statues that stand today were originally painted plaster. The marble and bronze were added as money allowed.

Believe it or not, I'm a sucker for patriotism. I still get goosebumps during the Star-Spangled Banner.

I spent the whole day learning about and walking in the steps of Lincoln. And then there I was, entering his final resting place. There was a group of what looked like junior high kids in the foyer of the tomb. After when the volunteer tomb guide was done with her spiel someone asks if the kids would sing again.

I wasn't in the mood to stand and watch them so I headed down the curving, marble-lined corridor towards the tomb.

Apparently marble is great at carrying the sound. Because as I slowly walked the red marbled hall, I could hear the echoing of the Battle Hymn of the Republic being sung in unison behind us. As I made our way towards the tomb, the choir was changing from unison, to two part harmony, then three part and so on.

Finally I stood in front of his sarcophagus, the choir, now in full harmony by the third verse, was echoing through the chamber.

I was the only one in the tomb and for no reason at all,  I started tearing up. I stared at his name on the sarcophagus thinking how the man behind that name had changed the world so dramatically and about how many people had died for the cause of that change.

I headed down the other hall leading back to the foyer as the choir was finishing up the fourth verse.

I hate to admit it, but it was amazing.

I've always thought we all need a soundtrack to accompany us everywhere we go. This just proved it.