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Sunday, October 3, 2010

you are here

i love maps and globes and yet i am directionally impaired. if someone tells me the taco stand is on the southeast corner i look at them blankly. left or right? because the 'L' is my left thumb and pointer finger and that will never change. i never know if i am facing north or south unless i'm standing next to the ocean but i guarantee if you put me on the east coast, i would get it wrong. and here i am, in charge of teaching finn how the world works. sometimes i'm just passing along information that was passed along to me, unfiltered.

i was in my fourth year of college. my first week in 'images in film' i was required to write an essay discussing culture and society, ethnicity and class. i was an english major. i wrote papers in my sleep and my editing consisted mainly of correcting typing/spelling errors. remember typewriters? painstaking pounding of keys, attention to detail. first drafts always written by hand. i bought a super ugly electric typewriter/word processor that showed the line before it printed on a ticker above the keys and i felt a step above, streamlined. i finished the paper an hour before class and turned it in, smiling at my professor with the ignorance of a middle class woman who has always risen to the academic top. forgetting that the fat that rises up first generally gets skimmed off and discarded. the next class, a warning lecture to students. there is no excuse for failing to think critically. i half listened. i got an A in my critical analysis in literature class. these are skills i was born with. my paper gets handed back to me and he smiles as i take it. i smile back. on the top of the page, a note. 'well written with a complete disregard for critical thinking. must be an english major.' next to that a huge 'R' - you know, for REWRITE.
a simple two page essay. i rewrote it three times before it was accepted. i added american multicultural studies as a second major and dr. gray became my mentor and i, his assistant for the 'images in film' class. i critiqued and graded these weekly essays, he critiqued and graded my assessments. sometimes we disagreed, which led to some of the most stimulating discussions i have ever had about what it means to be human and why we do the things we do given certain parameters. all of a sudden, the map of my hands, left and right made sense because i realized that i have taken my sense of direction for granted.

i have accepted that my sense of direction is impaired. that i don't always know where i am, where i am going. that you can give me the ocean, but if you don't tell me what side of the world i am on (or if you stick me on an island) i will still not know if i am facing north or south. i will question the possibility of everything and i will watch my daughter learn to fill a bottle with water in the bathtub with awe and restraint. i will want to tell her to keep the opening submerged, at a slight angle, to watch for the bubbles rising to the surface, the air being replaced by water. but i won't. i will hold my words on the back of my tongue, a silent 'R.' and i will sit, silent and aware of how much i really don't know when i see her realize after a very short amount of time the correct way it works. that perhaps her sense of direction is something i don't have control over. i am merely the 'you are here' sticker on the map of her life. the place she starts from so that she knows where she is.

14 comments:

  1. such a vivid picture you paint with achingly beautiful words. thank you.

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  2. One thing Finn will always know, in the depths of whoever she becomes, is which direction she needs to continuously find home. You're a wonderous mother and teacher dear friend. (Hugs)Indigo

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  3. Growing up my sense of direction was pounded into me, since I moved from coast to coast, east to west, north to south all my life. I lived on the globes you get for Finn - yet today, older and staying in one fixed location, I find my sense of direction has been relegated to mostly left and right, then MapQuest and as of Saturday, now to TomTom - turn off my electronics, don't give me a printout of where I'm going, and I am utterly adrift at sea without a compass, sextant or stars to guide me.
    Finn, on the other hand, has the inquisitive mind and wherewithal to seek her own solutions - determinedly refusing assistance until she figures it out or gets so frustrated that she gives up temporarily. Her Mom and Dad are pretty darned smart, her Mimi is an older pretty smart, but I feel she will far surpass us and I, for one, will be her loudest cheerleader!!!!
    Thank you for letting me spend enough time with her that I am able to witness a lot of her discoveries too! Love you bunches! Mom

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  4. A mother as the 'you are here' sticker is such a wonderful metaphor! I really love that. Lovely post!

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  5. i'm great with directions and can usually get anywhere again as long as i go the right way at least once....but the problem is with life there is no one right way...so i keep going in the wrong directions trying to find the right path.

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  6. Oh me too. My husband is always directing me with go East, go North. DUDE! Rights, lefts....that's all I know. Thank goodness I have a car now with a navigation system. I have never felt so free to roam.

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  7. Holy shit, Krista. This is fantastic. I love it so much.

    You have no idea how strongly I feel that you need to be sharing your stories and reflections beyond this blog. I hope you are. Or that you will.

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  8. Oh! Oh! Krista! How do you do it, girl? I just love your reflections so much. And I agree with Elizabeth. You have so much to show and teach women. Tell me you are submitting your writing.

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  9. I have zero sense of direction. I could get lost in my own driveway. But my intuition is dead on, and I've always known where I wanted to go.

    I hope that counts for something in this universe. In the meantime, I've got a GPS for all that other shit.

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  10. Being around people with that impairment, i sympathize and having had that for a time during my recovery, I empathize.
    Now tho, I do not experience this and my old sense of direction (in places I do not know, at night with no light) is back. For me the time without it was very, very difficult.

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  11. This is one of your best to date....no rewrites!
    Susie T-11

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  12. i read this and thought it was wonderful and then thought elizabeth (clarity in the chaos) would love you and then went to comment and then saw she knows you well enough to type "holy shit" in your comments section. that made me feel smart and like the world makes sense.

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  13. Aw. And now I want to have a group hug with you, me and swonderful erin. <3

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  14. I, too, have a ridiculous lack of directional sense, and have also made peace with it. But that's not what struck me about your post. What I was thinking of was your brave, kind, true educator of a professor. I am so glad that most college students are blessed with at least one. One professor who wants more than to be published in academic journals and gain tenure. One professor who caress about their students. Who really, really wants to teach. I had one, too. Just one. But, oh - he was worth the entire price of tuition.

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use your kind words.