on finishing short novels whilst sitting under a tree

Today marked the official end of summer for me.

I know, I know. The semester offically began on Monday, and I have been working at least full-time hours for the last three or four weeks, but I didn't actually have a seminar until today. Granted, that seminar is with one of my favorite people here, but you know--it means that I have to officially set aside my own reading--most of which has been fun, some of which has been challenging.

I was able to take a brief moment today, before said seminar, and finish one of those books under a tree in the middle of our busy quad. Frisbees were being tossed, shirtless dudes were tightrope walking across their little tree-tied strap, sun shined, ants crawled (on my arm) and it was a moment. What a pretty place and what a pretty time to be in this place. Oh, and the book was Steinbeck's Tortilla Flat which is simply hilarious (and a bit tragic).

Without really realizing it, to conclude my first full summer in Champaign, along with reading a book about Monterey, CA (one of my favorite locals), I also happened to listen to the Beach Boys's Sounds of Summer: thirty songs of unadulterated, reverby, 3-part-harmonied, beachiness. (Which was followed, incidentally, with the Beatles White album, which is quite the lovely opposite.)

Despite the busyness, it has been a good summer. It had some amazing moments--but I hope to actually make it out of Illinois next summer.

Year One

We've been here a year--actually about a year two weeks. I am so pleased with the experiences that we have had since driving across the country with all of our earthy belongings from arid desert to humid heartland.

Here are the highlights, by category, as they come to me:

School (generally speaking)

I had no idea what to expect when we came to grad school. I mean, I had an inkling, but I didn't--couldn't--know what it was going to be like. From the moment I arrived on campus for orientation last year, I not only felt great about what I had gotten myself into, but I felt something I didn't expect: an immediate and overwhelming sense of friendship. My college experience before coming to Illinois was very much a singular experience for me. I didn't live in the dorms as a freshman; I got married in the sophomore year of my first degree; I had a few people I knew on campus, but never really had friends in my major. I was not your typical college student.

And, really, I'm not your typical grad student either. With three kids, I know my experience is a bit different than most of my fellow grad students. But, I've (I should say "we've" here--this is a team effort, right Tina?) been able to hang. The people here have really been what have made hanging a pleasure. Grad students and professors alike, I wonder if other people in other programs know what they are missing.

The Town

We have a good friend who just moved back to the mainland from Oahu where they lived for about three years. We feel a little bit like they did: on an island in the middle of the sea. Moving from the west was an adjustment for us--one that we are still getting used to, I think. When I say that we've been here for a year, I really mean it. We haven't gone anywhere (I did leave town for 48 hours to attend my Grandmother's funeral in April--but that barely counts as being away). We have been down to St. Louis, up to Chicago and over to Indianapolis (oh! and a cool trip to Nauvoo over spring break), but we haven't actually gone home. So that's been a bit hard for us and for our families. We have, though, been visited (in some cases more than once!) by most of our immediate family. We also got visits from nearly every one of my favorite friends some point during the year. Amazing.

That said, we really love it here. Really. I'm not joking. We came from the land of urban sprawl. It would take 30-45 minutes to get anywhere interesting. Here, everything is close. There are parks, events, music, farmer's market, friends--everything!!--all within 5-10 minutes from home. Amazing! We really love the town and feel like it is a great place to bring up kids. The coming year my oldest starts kindergarten, so we'll see how that works out. The humidity is a bit obnoxious from time to time, but really, weather like the stuff we've been having in the last few days, makes up for it. And I actually kind of liked the winter.

Music
Andrew Bird, Headlights, Jimmy Eat World, Bon Iver, Jeff Tweedy, Mates of State, Radiohead--and next month, Chris Thile and the Punch Brothers, and Yo La Tengo. Enough said.

Academics

It's been a challenging year for me intellectually. I repeat, it's been a challenging year for me intellectually. But I'm surrounded by support. "Learning the field"--especially a field as diverse as Writing Studies--is a challenge, but I have been met with several surprises. I love that my program allows me--encourages me, even--to take classes in several departments and subjects. I've already had several "interdisciplinary" experiences--I'm looking forward to many more.

People

I've alluded to this already as well, but we couldn't ask for a cooler community to belong to. Both Tina and I have made some great friends. And my kids? Well, both Seth and Maryn are doing just fine in the social department.

Year Two?

This next year is going to be a good one; I already know. I'm gonna take me some seminars. I'm gonna teach me some students. I'm gonna work my way through some tough scholarship. I'm gonna read me some graphic novels. I'm gonna learn me some lap slide.

Thus ends the long-form, once-a-month,(cough)boring, blog style that readers have come to expect from the guide. Expect, heretofore, a more abbreviated blog--not quite in the microblog "tweet" format, but with inspiration taken therefrom.

relieving the pressure

So, I took down poor Miss South Carolina's botched response. Is it fair to say that something like that could happen to any of us? Perhaps not to that extreme, but my intentions of putting her up weren't so much to poke fun as they were to attempt some kind of tele-empathy session. Is it any wonder that we fear public speaking more than we fear death?

Anyway, I finished up the first full week of classes (the first week that I speak of below was really only 3 days). Things are going well, I think. Though the pacing/routine hasn't yet solidified. Once that gets in place I think that I will start to feel more productive.

We've been in Champaign a month now. I have to admit that the fun "newness" has begun to fade. Which is good, I guess, because in it's wake is the feeling of familiarity and home. We know how to get around town now pretty well. We have a few favorite treat shops. Campus also has begun to be more familiar as well. I have done some exploring, begun studying in the same places (so far, the best reading place I have found is in the reference section of our Main Library--nice soft chairs, computers nearby for hourly email check/fix).

I think that the "newness" feeling may return once the weather begins to cool down significantly. It's been 20 years since I lived in a place where it snows. I don't even know what it is like to have to function productively in cold weather. My only exposure to cold weather since our move from Logan has been in vacation visits to my parents in Wyoming and Utah. And how did I handle the cold weather while there? By staying indoors and watching many movies. I remember the one time that I attempted driving while there was snow on the roads. It was during an attempt to start the trek home to Arizona from Utah. When our car slid off the road down the street from my parents' house, we drove back, got out of the car, and stayed for three more days.

the Champaign Campaign continues (a multimedia presentation)

We have been in Champaign now for 16 days. In those days, 3 is the number of times we have gone out to eat at Chipotle as a family (I've been one more time than that)--shout out "thanks!" to Wendy here. 3 is also the number of times that we have patronized a certain custard shop right down the street from us for 1 and 2 dollar ice cream waffle-cones. 3 is also the number of times that Seth has watched Star Wars in the last few days. He has decided that he is over his fear or the live action movies and is especially into "A New Hope" because it has both the Millennium Falcon and the X-wing in it.

The last four days for me have been spent in a new grad student orientation. One of those days it was just a general session (this is how many years you can expect to be here before receiving the PhD, this is how we support our students, this is what grad student life is like, etc.). The last three days have been teacher training days. I am teaching one section of Rhetoric 103 (basically Writing or English 101--maybe later I will go into the details of how they run freshman composition here). It has been good. My particular session has been with four other incoming grad students who, like me, have already had some teaching experience. So I am currently thinking a lot about the syllabus and class expectations documents that I am going to have to have ready when my class begins on Wednesday. Overall, I would have to say that I am very pleased with the people, the program, and the particulars of the department and campus. I have office space wherewith I can commiserate/share ideas with other students who are teaching the same material as I am. I am excited to being teaching and hope to have some fun experiences to share.

One of the things that was said numerous times at our first day of orientation was that a graduate student's first obligation is to their coursework and second to their teaching. There was some talk about how it is easy to let teaching be the thing that gets a lion's share of the time and resources devoted to it, because it is the thing that provides immediate rewards. Also, when you are teaching, there is no hiding if you are under prepared. You can hide out in a class that you haven't prepared for as much. This seems very true, and will be difficult to balance. I am much more confident (duh!) about my abilities in the classroom as a teacher than I am in my abilities in the ever-scary graduate seminar (class). I picked up several of the books for some of the classes that I am taking, but really had to rethink whether I wanted to take one of them merely by the materials that were required for it. This one class had more books (and tough materials at that!) required for it than all of my other classes put together! So, I am dealing with those kinds of anxieties.

I have been walking a lot. The institute parking lot that I have been parking at is clear on the other side of campus from the English building. My shin muscles especially (maybe because of all the stair climbing?) are sore. Either next week or the following, I will be making frequent visits to the gym. Maybe then I will stop feeling so out of shape and round. :)

There have been a few frustrating moments this week that have added a bit to the already stressful nature of beginning at the University. The picture below is a representation of one of those frustrations. At the beginning of the week, my old, indestructible Powerbook started giving me trouble. Basically, the little female adapter started coming loose so that it wouldn't recognize the male adapter when it was plugged in. Since the battery is already shot, this little problem caused it to completely loose its charge, eventually making it impossible to power up. I thought that maybe I could fix it (if you are laughing right now, don't worry, you're not alone. Somebody else seems to think that I am the antithesis of "handy"). I went to Home Depot and bought my first soldering iron.

After what had to be an hour I finally got it to the state that you see below. Getting that little chip out and accessible was nearly impossible. You can see the little thing that I needed to fix sticking out in the middle. Sure enough, it had come unsoldered from the circuit board. I did what I could to reattach it and thought that I had been successful, but when I put it all back together, it still wouldn't work. Mat thinks I may have fried it with the soldering iron being too hot. I can imagine that happening because everything is so close together on the board. But still it stinks. Having that computer was super useful (and I am ever-so gracious to Mat for hooking me up with it in the first place). A new laptop, while it will happen eventually, is a little ways down on the list of current necessities, so I'm gonna have to make do without one for now.

Here, however, is a Home Depot success story. While we were there looking for the soldering iron, I came across several wall-hanging devices that I thought might work for my guitars. Space is limited here, so i thought it would be cool to get a few of them up on the wall. I found these broom/outdoor appliance hangers for 6 bucks and they do the trick quite nicely, I think. The acoustic guitar body is too deep to work, so I've got a little tribute to Fender going on instead.

We have done most of the picture hanging in the house by now. I am particularly pleased with how these pieces look--thanks, Mom, for the perfect IKEA frames.

Finally, one of the very best things about being here is that fresh produce is super-accessible. Yesterday we went to the Farmer's Market in Urbana and got some fresh tomatoes, cucumbers (small like the should be!), corn and onions. The tomatoes especially are delicious. We are looking forward to growing some of our own next year.

I had a proud moment at lunch when I made what was already destined to be a delicious BLT all that much better. We used spinach instead of lettuce, added red onion, two kinds of tomato, and right before eating it, Tina was cutting a pear and I thought, "ah-ha! that would be so awesome on it too!" And it was. Here is my first (hopefully of many) food pic. We were trying to figure out what to call it. B-Stop? (bacon, spinach, tomato, onion, pear).

p.s. I am not the biggest fan of the band "the Fray." I have kind of played them off because of their huge commercial success. I don't know. Maybe it's the dude's haircut. But I don't know that I can diss/resist too much longer. A few weeks ago when I was driving the huge Penske truck back to the Penske place, their song "Over My Head" came on the radio. There have been moments lately when I feel this same way.

Cardinal

I had a little visitor today while I was beginning to read the text that I will be using in the class I am teaching this fall. I hoped for a better, front-view shot, but this was as good as I could get. The color is brilliant though, isn't it?

More pictures

Here are a few more pictures of the fam taken in the last few weeks:

At the base of the Arch

In front of the English Building at UIUC

In front of the famous "Alma Mater" statue (You know, Tow Mater's mom!), UIUC

New Digs

I know that some of you (Mom) have been waiting all week for some pictures, so here are some (finally). Last night we got the remainder of the stuff put away, and now it's just a matter of getting pictures hung and that kind of stuff.

There is an update on the status of the jonstone.com purchase. The "other" Jon Stone finally has the cash together, so the site's days are numbered. It has been a good run. I am thinking that rather than mirror what is on the current site in a new domain, I am just going to start an online Picassa page with new pictures. I will send out a link to that site as soon as jonstone.com goes black (here's to hoping that whatever www.jonstone.com is about to become is not a naughty site that people will go to expecting to see our kids!)

Front Door

Front Room

Kitchen

Basement Playroom

Computer Area

Back Door

Backyard Area (thumbs up from Seth)

As you can see, the backyard isn't really that grassy, but the kids should have some fun exploring back there (that is, if Seth can overcome his fear of bugs!). I know that there aren't any pictures here of the upstairs rooms. I will get those up eventually. For now, just imagine three very small rooms.

More later, off to Chipotle!

the arrival...

We made it. And not only did we make it, but we made it without any serious incident or occurrence and even managed to have a little fun along the way. I assume we will get some pictures up soon--my internet has only been working for about 4 hours.

Champaign is lovely. It reminds me a little of Logan and Cache Valley but without the mountains. The homes here are nice and many of them are older but very well kept. The town has almost everything that Tina could want by way of shopping. And the University, of course, is beautiful.

I don't have to do anything school related until next Wednesday, so the next week can be spent organizing our home and exploring the town.

We are in the process of switching our phone numbers and stuff...when I get all that worked out, I will send a mass email.

When we first arrived on Friday night we went out into our little backyard area and were greeted with little flame-like flashes of light. Fireflies. None of us had ever seen them before and their tiny beauty was a calming welcome to us.

off to explore...more soon.

hitting the road

Everything we own is outside in a big yellow truck. We are packed and ready. My back is aching! After the glorious upgrade to the fancier truck, the load went smoothly--especially with the help from the four Bonanza men who helped us intricately place each item in its place.

Tomorrow's destination: Vega, Texas (9 hours from Tucson as the crow flies)

Thursday's destination: Springfield, MO (with a stop in Oklahoma City for lunch at Toby Keith's "I Love This Bar And Grill." (8 hours)

Friday we pull into Champaign after a stop in St. Louis at the ever-famous Arch. (6.5 hours).

We're only supposed to go 55 in the truck since we are pulling a trailer so it's gonna take us a bit longer.

There should be good Champaign folk to help up unpack when arrive.

See you when we get there.