The Opportunities of a Global Village

Another article published in Reporter magazine.

http://reportermag.com/article/minority-report/the-opportunities-of-a-global-village

Next week I’ll have one published about TEDxRochester for those of you who couldn’t attend!

Picture the Impossible

I had another article published in the Reporter (RIT’s school magazine) today.

I’m pretty happy with it! However, there are some editing errors in there that I’m less happy about. Not sure if the errors appear in the print version. Let me know what you think!

http://reportermag.com/article/10-02-2009/picture-the-impossible

Published!

I’m coming back after having no blog posts for almost 2 months with some exciting news: I’ve been hired as a writer for Reporter magazine, RIT’s weekly publication. Yay!

I’m currently writing for the “news” and “views” sections in the magazine.

My first assignment was to cover the weekly Student Government meeting (riveting material, I know). For those of you who want to read my first published article, click below.

http://reportermag.com/article/09-25-2009/sg-update

I’m submitting a way more exciting article tomorrow, which will be published next week. I’ll be sure to post that one too!

I’ll also write more soon about all of the exciting journalist things that I’ve been up to lately.

Silencing Those Nagging Women

When I was a liberal arts major at SCCC, I took a course called “Language, Women, and Gender.” It was a very good, yet sparsely attended, class; I think there were five girls and two boys. This, however, made for very intimate and thorough discussions during every class. The lectures and readings were usually very interesting, and there are several that have stuck with me until today. One of these was our reading and discussion on “branks” (also referred to as “scold’s bridle,” “gossip’s bridle,” or “scold’s helm”) and their use in Medival times. I had no idea that anything like this existed or was used for such a long period of time. Therefore, I am sharing this knowledge for those similarly unenlightened folks out there.

Usage of branks has been recorded in both England and Scotland from 1567 to as recently as 1856. I have read rumors of their use in America, but could not find a reliable source to confirm this.

One witness to a 1653 bridling described this contraption,

… like a crown, it being of iron which was musled, over the head and face, with a great gap [sic], or tongue

This is a good general description of most branks. However, this attractive headpiece came in a plethora of styles, ranging from those which served the sole purpose of humiliating the victim to those that actually mutilated the tongue.

The most humiliating branks I have found are the ones that attempt to make the wearer look like various animals. At least this one has a flat mouthpiece instead of a spiked one.

Now, who reaped the punishment of such a device? First of all, it was only the women. This was probably because they were the only ones to challenge or upset the male-dominated society of their time. If they weren’t doing that, they were busy scolding, nagging, or gossiping. Any of these activities, of course, deserved cruel and unusual punishment. These women were to be silenced and taught their place.

Generally, the tortured were locked into the masks and either lead through the town by an officer (and rope), confined to the town square for public humiliation, or beaten.

My First Memory

I am sitting in my family room one evening at our kid-size wooden table. Tonight, my oldest sister, Yvonne, is in charge of making dinner. Since she does not usually cook, our meal turned out a little less than appetizing. However, I manage to force down a few bites of the dry, burnt hamburger sitting in front of me because I know that soon after we are leaving to visit my Mom and my new baby sister.

Later that night we are at the hospital and I am required to put on a green, papery dressing gown and cap. Can I hold her now? I have overcome some pretty intense obstacles tonight for being 2 years and 9 months old, so I think I deserve it.

Finally, I am now holding my sister, Ellie. My Mom looks happy.

This is my earliest memory of childhood. For a long time I thought it was Yvonne’s birthday party when I was about 5, but then this one came back to me rather vividly. I’ve found that most people I’ve asked remember a memory in great detail from age 4 or 5, but nothing younger. Anybody else have an earlier than usual first memory like me? Also, when you do think back to this memory, try to figure out if you’re actually recalling a memory, or if you only remember it because there is a picture and/or video of the moment. Memories can be tricky like that.

20 Things I Miss

Don’t get me wrong, my life is great right now, but I do miss…

Activities:

• Thrift store shopping
• Dancing with people I don’t know
• Waitressing
• Spending time with family
• Getting lost on purpose
• Playing tennis
• Diving for pennies
• Making my driveway into a chalk house

Food:

• Stewart’s Iced Cafe Cooler
• Bubbles ice cream (Coffee Raspberry Twist!)
• Crispy M&M’s
• Taco Pronto
• Dogs N Suds Root Beer
• The Original Frozen Custard (Indiana)

Other:

• My cat Gunther
• Skip Parson’s River Boat Jazz Band
• Having no cares or worries
• My Grandmother’s house / doll museum
• Knowing how to play piano
• Good Nickelodeon shows

At least I will get to see/taste/experience most of these items again at some time in my life, except for Taco Pronto (closed), Crispy M&M’s (unless I travel to Europe, Australasia, or southeast Asia), and my Grandmother’s house. I guess three out of twenty isn’t bad. But darn, Taco Pronto was yummy.

Update on Vintage Jazz Dance Course

I have recently been in contact with the wellness program coordinator and dance coordinator at RIT about teaching a vintage jazz dance course. After several weeks of little response from them, I finally got some sort of result. The RIT wellness team has their next meeting in August where new courses are proposed. Since the fall schedule is completely booked, the earliest they could offer this course would be in the winter (what I expected). Both people I have contacted are on board for the class idea, even though they haven’t put any further thought into how I will be able to get on payroll and have access to staff resources. The wellness coordinator promised she would not forget about the class and would discuss it with the rest of the board in August.

I’m pretty happy that this idea is not being thrown aside just because I’m a student. Now we wait until August.

I Can Bake.

I always knew I could bake a mean batch of cookies, but since I’ve moved away from home I’ve discovered I can bake a lot more than that. Maybe I somehow inherited this skill from my younger sister (don’t ask me how I can inherit something from a younger sibling), Ellie, who is majoring in baking at SCCC. Now I just need to work on inheriting the ability to make a delicious homemade pizza crust from my older sister, Nikki, and gluten-free delights from my oldest sister, Yvonne.

So far, my quintessential recipes include: crepes, blueberry cream cheese coffee cake, and honey-glazed corn bread.

Double Chocolate Cookies

I’m trying to add double chocolate cookies to this list, but I am still in the process of perfecting the recipe. The last batch I made (pictured) was very good, but very dense. I want to try to make them a bit more gooey and chewy. I usually like it when the cookies flatten while baking, but this recipe didn’t do that. As you can see, I played around with the shape of them a bit. Most people preferred the nearest cookie in the picture because it appeared to contain more chunkers.

After I perfect this recipe, I’m going to start playing around with spices. Ultimately, I want to have a good Mexican chocolate cookie recipe. Delicious. I will invite you all over when this has been accomplished.

Destroy, Delete, Depart: I Do It All.

I have come to be known (thanks to Mike) as The Destroyer, Deleter, and Departer. While this may seem like a far cry from the days when I used to get out of chores at home by claiming, “I’m the weakest!”, they are actually quite fitting.

I think that I am called “The Destroyer” and “The Deleter” for the same reasons: I like to delete and dispose of things (I guess I could also be called “The Disposer”). When I take a bad picture, I don’t wait to look at it on the computer, I delete it right away. When there seem to be too many files in a given folder on my computer or in my email, I’ll delete some. It’s strange, but I like putting items in the garbage can or recycle bin. Basically, I like getting unneeded items off of my computer, camera, out of the house, etc. While most people dread cleaning out that one room that’s full items you didn’t know where to put, it is a fun challenge for me. I’m actually looking forward to cleaning the rest of the almost scarily cluttered rooms at the Compound. My goal is to get to the last three, and most difficult, rooms done this summer (with the help of Mike, Ross, and whoever else wants to join in on the fun).

Another legendary Destroyer moment was when I destroyed a bee … with my head.

“The Departer” sounds like a pretty frickin’ sweet super hero name to me. How I got the name? Not quite as frickin’ sweet. When I’m out, and have finished my activity (usually dancing) for the evening, I want to leave. No dilly dallying here. There are times when this is not the case, but usually I want to get home, have time to get a few things done, and go to bed. This seems strange even to me sometimes, given that I consider myself a night owl and have no problem staying up at late night parties (frankly, I couldn’t live here if I had a problem with that).

So don’t be offended if I leave a dance or party “on time” or even early, It’s not because I don’t like you, it’s because I’m The Departer.

The Spirit of the RIT Swing Club

I have been president and teacher of the RIT Swing Dance Club since I moved here in September. We had our last class of the school year about three weeks ago and I find myself already missing it. I know it will be back in the fall with several of my lovely students from this past year and also a fresh batch of nervous, bright-eyed college kids awkwardly stumbling through the basic steps.

I used to teach regularly for the RPI and Skidmore swing clubs, but teaching at RIT has been very different; they already had an established club with returning members and I was coming in as this new strange teacher that nobody knew. Oh, and I was their new president. Would they listen to me? Well, it was a process.

I had observed one class while on a visit to RIT during the spring of 2008 and realized that it needed much more structure and authority. I had to get students used to a format of warming up, creating a circle, paying attention when I spoke, asking questions, and realizing that they can still have fun while doing all of this.

This was also one of the first times I had taught without my sister, Ellie. I usually had somebody there to lead or follow what I was teaching (thanks Laura and Dan!), but I quickly realized it was pretty exhausting to teach both sides of the dance (especially on the days I forgot the microphone). However, I do think it made me a much better teacher and I’m glad I was kind of pushed into it.

For the fall quarter, I taught basics for the full two hours. I think it was during the winter quarter that I decided I should divide the class into two one-hour classes, the first for beginners and the second for anyone who had completed a quarter of club already. I had great success with this and the classes were usually of similar size and enthusiasm. I think the returning members were happy to be learning again, and I was really happy to see that they all still came to the first class to help out the newcomers.

What has made me most happy about being involved with the RIT swing club has been seeing my students become part of the Rochester Lindy Hop scene. They consistently support our events and they have brought a lot of spirit into the scene. It’s sad to see a lot of them leave for the summer, but I know they’ll bring that same spirit to their hometown and then back to Rochester again in the fall.

"Have you seen... my better half?"

A lot has changed with the club during the past year but it has been a lot of fun making these changes. I’m pretty proud that we managed to give every student a practice CD, partial admission to the Boston Tea Party, an awesome T-shirt designed by Adrian (pictured), and what else? Oh yeah, Lindy Hop.

For next year we have a new and larger Executive Board with positions that did not exist before (PR/Advertising and Events Coordinator) and will make the club even more successful. In the works for next year: more outside instruction, a working website, and the first live-band dance in years!

Another thing I would love to offer at RIT is a wellness course about vintage jazz dancing. Students are required to take these courses to graduate and right now the only course that is close to this is a beginner Latin/swing course (mostly Latin). I want to teach dances like Charleston, Black Bottom, Cake Walk, Big Apple, and Lindy Hop. I’ve proposed this course to the wellness program director and, while she likes the idea, she doesn’t think I can teach it because students cannot be on payroll or have access to Faculty/Staff advising. I made some suggestions proposing how to get around this but I haven’t heard back from her yet. I’ve also been trying to get other local colleges into the idea, with no success so far.

I would love to hear comments or suggestions about the RIT swing club and my idea for a wellness course.
I’m sure there are many people out there who have taught at or been a part of college swing clubs. I want to hear from  you!

Also, T-shirts are $15 and benefit the RIT Swing Dance Club! Just sayin’.