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I feel like I'm being driven crazy. It's so confusing and so hard to keep going when everything's so nutty. I have to say this somewhere there's really nobody to talk to...

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Things we forgot <i>this</i> time: 

S: molds for making soap from my classroom. flovent. yoga mat. ranch recipe, pretty labels. 

R: toothbrush, asthma meds

K: underwear. swears: “I didn’t forget it, it must have fallen out!”

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Plenty of words for this but I’ll leave it just an image for now

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The major problem is I would rather die than sit in front of a computer right now... Grinding to a halt

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Sortof Summer

From teacher’s experience: School ends. All the parents/students cheer at us, “Happy Summer!” and we smile and nod and say thank you. 

but it’s not summer, not yet! 

We have miles of end of year clean out, in-service, reports, etc. to walk and run through. Meetings! (I actually like meetings - life is what you make it)

I have come to call this liminal state “sort of summer” 

This year’s sort of summer is the most strange sort of

oh Doe, I know, it’s not very sensual

but the lilt and play of the syllables, regardless

please taste them

el is the sound of water

the elements are there in the liminal land

I have come to remember, my home is like a wizard’s tower

a curiosity shop

we did this deliberately, layer upon layer of wonder, gleaming glass flashing over hewn wood and bone and stone

and the books! 

I am going to 

I want to

Touch, running a finger over the spines and taste, licking the corners and vines, the place I made

it is indeed my art

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I just want to scream and scream and scream. But that would probably make it worse. 

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I think I’ve maybe kind a sort lost my mind. I mean, everything is on its head. Nothing is ever going to be the same, things have changed so rapidly and so much has happened while I was treading water, was I present? I’ve never had a class make me feel so brain dead and blind. (it’s over). Staying in the moment, not letting the future creep in - we’re struggling for this together....what is real anymore. I don’t want people to see me, I want to go back to normal. The best fun is surprising people and when the kids are happy. I’m okay, I’m doing amazing... I’m... I’ve been sitting here for hours, accomplishing not what I set out to accomplish. I just need to do it... hard to do it and let it go. need to do something major about getting out of my own way. It’s all swirling and obvious and ridiculous as a result. How can one have such a hectic schedule while staying at home? I want freedom. I need a break. I want to accomplish. I want to do everything. I need to let other people do it. Technology seems off today too, way off. No responses to so many things... what is going on? what is coming? 

I did it. almost. and that last push... crawling, dragging to the end. or ... it’s so easy! Does it have to make sense? If I have to explain it to you, you won’t understand... so why make sense? What’s it for? Better to confuse and raise questions? I want to pour all the love in. I have noticed, but not understood, rhythms I never saw before. there are times of day that are better for certain activities than others.

and ergonomics have to come into play, like yesterday. I have numbness and tingling on both hands. This computer set up is not sustainable. For any of us, probably. I know it’s all alright, and I know it’s all not. all at once, all over us. So. close. Trust. Jump in! let go! just let it go... 

3 guesses

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I’m DONE with my writing class. yay. 

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on you must go.

this is SOME what I have to do by midnight... ack. 

-add some photos to my pres + 2 scanned pages - 

Reflection on Culminating Project

Write a 500-600 word formal letter to me that reflects on the choices you made in creating the final product portion of your Culminating Project.  Please include why you think your choices were effective. Please specifically address why you chose the genre you did, who your audience is (we already had to do this part in another assignment), and how your text meets genre and audience expectations.

Please also specifically address the types of language you chose to use.  This might include if you chose to use discipline or field specific jargon, the level of formality you chose, if you wrote in something that might be considered “edited academic English” or in some other variety of English (or something code-meshed that uses a language other than English or more than one kind of English).

You may choose to include reflections on how the final product shifted from its conception in the proposal through the A & G analysis to its final form.  This is not a requirement, but might be useful to consider.

If you did not explicitly use the research you did in the text itself of the final product, you also need to address what research you did and why you did that type of research.

Please make sure you have specific examples from your text and/or research as evidence in the letter.

Presentation on Final Project

A common component of both scholarly and professional writing is preparing a presentation for an academic or professional conference/meeting. Please create a PowerPoint or Prezi you would use in a presentation associated with your culminating project.  You can determine both context (a conference, sharing with your classmates what you have done, business meeting, etc.)and audience. In all cases, you need to consider that there also will be a part of the audience who will read the slides but not attend the presentation.  All of the information in the slides should be drawn from your final project, but you will selectively use what seems best suited for the presentation. Also consider where information came from and include citations as appropriate.

Part 1

The presentation must:

§  Include a minimum of 6 slides and a maximum of 10 slides (PowerPoint or Prezi)

§  Be designed for a 5-7 minute total length

§  Be designed for an appropriate and specific audience

§  Be easy to read and not contain too much written information

§  Include some graphic or visual element (pictures, tables, graphs, etc.)

Keep in mind how will my audience understand the information if I’m not there and my professor says I CANNOT pack 500 words into one slide. You’ll have to make wise choices.

Part 2

You will also turn in a brief (150-250 word) reflection to me using business or formal letter format (like earlier in the semester).  This reflection will explain what context the presentation was designed for, including who your audience is, and why, explain why you chose the graphic elements you did, and explain why you think the presentation is effective both for those in attendance and those who will review the slides only.

Grading

This project will be graded on audience appropriateness, use of appropriate design elements, clarity of argument, and appropriate use of medium. A separate point sheet will be posted.

Presentation Grade Sheet

 Name________________________________

Number of slides_____________ (minimum of 6 and a maximum of 10)

Reflection submitted:                             YES       NO

Graphic or visual element included:               YES       NO

 Reflection (25)

·       Clear context for presentation included (2)

·       Audience clearly defined (3)

·       Audience rationale clear and appropriate (5)

·       Effective explanation of graphic choice(s) (5)

·       Clear explanation of why slides are effective to audience that sees only the slides (5)

·       Clear explanation of why presentation is effective to audience in attendance (5)

 Presentation and Slides (50)

·       Language (slides) appropriate to audience (10)

·       Use of concise and effective text on slides (10)

·       Effective slide organization and content (10)

·       Effective slide design (color, font, contrast, etc.) (5)

·       Clear purpose for content in this context (10)

·       Documentation using an appropriate style guide (5)

Grade/Comments:

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This is in  my thesis, but you’d never recognize it. 

I kinda want to shout this from the rooftops: 

I am over the moon! I am so glad I did that third version of my thesis presentation (millionth version).  I still think I could go back and do a bare bones,  but most of my audience has never seen my art. I don't show it much. 

I still have so much to do, but I'm floating and giddy and laughing and crying. 

To my Professor Williamlmoore: Thank you so much. I cannot imagine a kinder, more supportive professor for this process. Seriously. Your attitude was perfect and I am so full of gratitude for you! I want to decorate your house and express my gratitude in any way possible! I'm so grateful for who you are.  I love it that your 4D class's assignment was to turn everything off. I feel like you really GET IT. 

*screaming and cheering and jumping up and down and hugs*

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The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock 

BY T. S. ELIOT

S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse A persona che mai tornasse al mondo, Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse. Ma percioche giammai di questo fondo Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero, Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.

Let us go then, you and I,

When the evening is spread out against the sky

Like a patient etherized upon a table;

Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,

The muttering retreats

Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels

And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:

Streets that follow like a tedious argument

Of insidious intent

To lead you to an overwhelming question ...

Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”

Let us go and make our visit.

In the room the women come and go

Talking of Michelangelo.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,

The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes,

Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,

Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,

Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,

Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,

And seeing that it was a soft October night,

Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

And indeed there will be time

For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,

Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;

There will be time, there will be time

To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;

There will be time to murder and create,

And time for all the works and days of hands

That lift and drop a question on your plate;

Time for you and time for me,

And time yet for a hundred indecisions,

And for a hundred visions and revisions,

Before the taking of a toast and tea.

In the room the women come and go

Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time

To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”

Time to turn back and descend the stair,

With a bald spot in the middle of my hair —

(They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”)

My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,

My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin —

(They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”)

Do I dare

Disturb the universe?

In a minute there is time

For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

For I have known them all already, known them all:

Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,

I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;

I know the voices dying with a dying fall

Beneath the music from a farther room.

              So how should I presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all—

The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,

And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,

When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,

Then how should I begin

To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?

              And how should I presume?

And I have known the arms already, known them all—

Arms that are braceleted and white and bare

(But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!)

Is it perfume from a dress

That makes me so digress?

Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.

              And should I then presume?

              And how should I begin?

Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets

And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes

Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows? ...

I should have been a pair of ragged claws

Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!

Smoothed by long fingers,

Asleep ... tired ... or it malingers,

Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.

Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,

Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?

But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,

Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,

I am no prophet — and here’s no great matter;

I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,

And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,

And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,

After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,

Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,

Would it have been worth while,

To have bitten off the matter with a smile,

To have squeezed the universe into a ball

To roll it towards some overwhelming question,

To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead,

Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”—

If one, settling a pillow by her head

              Should say: “That is not what I meant at all;

              That is not it, at all.”

And would it have been worth it, after all,

Would it have been worth while,

After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,

After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—

And this, and so much more?—

It is impossible to say just what I mean!

But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:

Would it have been worth while

If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,

And turning toward the window, should say:

              “That is not it at all,

              That is not what I meant, at all.”

No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;

Am an attendant lord, one that will do

To swell a progress, start a scene or two,

Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,

Deferential, glad to be of use,

Politic, cautious, and meticulous;

Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;

At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—

Almost, at times, the Fool.

I grow old ... I grow old ...

I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind?   Do I dare to eat a peach?

I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.

I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think that they will sing to me.

I have seen them riding seaward on the waves

Combing the white hair of the waves blown back

When the wind blows the water white and black.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea

By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown

Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

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I put off paying for my medication for over a month. I finally go to do it and the website is down! 

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when I look at the computer, I can’t see anymore. what a day.

“it’s only as hard as you make it”. but I guess we learn from hard.

Lots of paradox, contradiction, work to do on screens and desire to get aay from them for a long time. 

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rendering attempt 2... for some reason the first one put an extra 10 minutes in the video...  meep.

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*insert screams* so close and so far, my brain is dissolving. 

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Things to remember:

K: “In my dream we were on a mission and I was a bee.... I polinated doors...”

I honestly don’t see how I can prepare for my symposium with my 3rd grader coming in here every 5 minutes with a problem. 

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devastation (but not defenestration)

epic fail. 

And part of this process I want to record is that I usually feel pretty comfortable in my body, I do yoga on a regular basis... installing makes me feel like I’ve been hit by a truck. By the end of the night, I could barely get up, I was so tired. The next morning my feet hurt, many other bits hurt. I tweaked my shoulder washing my hair and it’s all messed up. 

I really wish that as a society we’d get our priorities straight and realize that nothing is worth the overwhelming work and stress of finals and so many other things we inflict upon each other. It’s not right. We all should live balanced lives at a healthy pace. *stomp*

I am not a slacker. My “to-do’s” frighten others and I work hard, fast and diligently. So when it’s too much for me. it’s. too. much. 

I know exactly how I want my video to work. I know it should work. I got unstuck several times. But I give up. The tools I’m looking for aren’t there and I just need someone who knows what they’re doing to be with me in a few key seconds to make this all come together. The helps I’ve searched, just don’t quite cut it and I have too many other pieces undone. I am sure that this would be CAKE for several people I know... ripped in half, broken, part of me wants to say one thing and part of me wants to say another and all of me is going to bed.