Kontan’s Place

meet Tiki. tiki is our newest family member and is an 11 week old miniature dachsund, red dapple variety. she is a real sweety.

i chose the name tiki because i used to have a dog named tiki, she was a cocker spaniel/dachsund mix that had puppies, one of which i kept, gruffy. gruffy had beagle in him, but was this brown color. i had gruffy when i married and have always wanted a dog similar to him. well here we have her, tiki!

i had never researched the name. i heard it on a tv show once and just really liked it. i knew it meant luck, but not it’s origin. tonight i googled it and found out that it is a maori word from the polynesian settlers in new zealand. so now i’m wondering if “tiki” means something else. i’ve asked around, hopefully i will know soon.

five years ago i taught a young man that is one of the smartest students i have ever taught. he was also one of the laziest! will was an amazing kid. as an 11th grader he had more of the southern gentleman in him than most grown men i have encountered. he held the door, he said yes ma’am and no ma’am. and it wasn’t just with adults, but even his peers. will had a lot of issues to deal with in life, but he was a good kid. his dad a pilot he would often fly to various places around the states or world. independent young man, held a job, and passed his classes. even after he was out of my class he would drop by to chat or just to say hello. he graduated and i didn’t see him for a while. then one day he stopped by. he had lost weight and matured. turns out he had joined the military and had just returned from basic. it was great to see that he had straightened out a lot of his life and was making a life for himself. i have often wondered the last few years how will was doing. was he sent to iraq or afghanistan? i didn’t know how to find out. it is the nature of the job, many times you never know what happens to your kids. they move on and so do you.

i was sitting at lunch today talking with several other teachers about how some students were so comfortable coming to us with anything. i fondly thought of will and several other students who frequently stop by for advice. it was then i wondered again what happened to will. the bell rings and i go back to my room, waiting on my next class to come in hyper from lunch. there was a strange man in my room. he was dressed in camo looking at a map. i stood their for a moment, about to ask if i could help him with anything. he turned around. the face was familiar, but i wasn’t sure why and then it hit me…WILL! he explained where he had been stationed, and where he would be sent in the next few months. he didn’t stay long as i had students coming in. but he was the will i remember. and he had made it. he was happy and receiving an education that would prepare him for civilian life upon discharge. i am so proud of him. despite the frustrations of his life, he was doing something with it.

it is rare that students return, much less return more than once. djembe, who already knew what a difficult day i had been facing, said, “God gives you those visits to let you know that teaching is indeed worth it.” i agree. despite days like today where i had to deal with a horrible sub report from yesterday, this is a job that i love…this is a job where i can make a difference for someone. it is indeed worth it.

welcome to winter…and winter in the south where the weather is totally unpredictable. my children could have worn shorts to school today. in fact they did yesterday. tomorrow they will have to dress in long sleeves. what’s up? for several days i felt like we skipped fall and winter and went straight to spring! it was beautiful…killer on my sinuses though. the change of weather beats me down. i stayed home today to deal with it and rest.

i’m currently working on motivation for several projects. first, it is imperative that i finish my grad essays and annotated bibliography. i havent even chosen a topic for the bib yet! no prob. i will get it done. i’m just SICK of working on school stuffs. i’m ready for it to be done. the essays are actually not uninteresting. i will finish up the “happy days” one tomorrow. all are dealing with 1945- present and easy read information. all comes down to motivation. i need it! i want to get it out of the way before thanksgiving too.

we are in the process of redecorating. i’m stuggling wit ideas for certain areas of the home. i think the master bedroom and bath is set. djembe and i explored the local bed, bath, and beyond and found a bedding set that i really like. now i have to find the furniture i want. the girls rooms will not be too difficult, other than cleaning and organizing…yuck! kids are messy individuals. hopefully the new arrangement will work better. “froggy” wants a horse theme using one of gran’s paintings. this works great for me….we’ll just go southwest style. “tweety” wants pink. no. i refuse to paint her room pink. i’m thinking more of a pastel or bright green with pink accents. i want to match some of the stuff we already have. the kids will need little furniture added. the kitchen is what has us stumped. and i’m not sure what to do in the girls’ bathroom either. i think leave it like it is with the lighthouse/beach theme…it just doesn’t fit. so i have to get motivated to shop and get ready to dig in to the work.

right now….i’m motivated to sleep.

Roland Marchand, in “Visions of Classlessness”, discussed the desire of 1950s society to eliminate the barriers of social class and the outward identifiers that defined them. This was a desire of at least the middle and lower classes. By the time of WWII unrestricted immigration had been cut for a full generation (144). This too led to a decline in the carriers of such culture: ethnically defined newspapers, theaters, and organizations. Regional differences were also becoming less apparent. In the 1950s a national culture was emerging.

Television is determined as the catalyst for the homogenation of America. The nature of advertising changed as consumerism swept the nation. The perception of prosperity took hold as more could be bought on credit, easing the disappearance of class definitions. Television emphasized this prosperity displaying ad depictions of families gathered about the set in harmony as they watch their favorite shows. Ads focused on the representation of “typical” families instead of “high” society models. California culture and life in suburia were represented as the norm.

In actuality the affluence of suburbia was inaccurately represented due to the prices of homes being out of league for those below median income. The portrayals of “typical” suburbia were really affordable only to the above average incomes. Although the increased standard of living could be achieved by credit buying, the gains in class definition were merely in name, not in the actuality of economic increase.

Another inacuracy of media portrayal is women’s roles. The media “romanticized domesticity” during a time when more than ever before married women worked outside the home.

(more on teenage concerns tomorrow)

When life gets difficult it is so important to realize that we are just ordinary people. We all make mistakes, we all have issues to deal with, we all have good and bad times. It is so important to live life fully, and treasure those we love…and let them know how much every chance we get.

The song below is one that I really enjoy. It is classified as neo-soul. I love the feeling in his voice. I love the bridge and really get into the piano. There is a light jazz funk to it that is moving. Love it. There are few top 40 songs out there these days that have really awesome piano parts. I have heard a few lately. There is an instrumental that I am trying to catch the artist name.

everytime i go home i am reminded of gran. it seems my aunt and i can’t get together without discussing her. you see, gran raised both of us. gran was my aunts mother, and my grandmother. my father and mother divorced when i was two. i lived with gran. my father was around most of the time, but that’s a different story. gran raised me. in every aspect of my life i can see gran’s influence. she was determined, creative, caring, and just an amazing woman. she loved art. she loved shells. and as i was reminded today, she loved butterflies. i don’t know how i had forgotten that, but she did. funny considering my current butterfly phase. gran would make butterflies and other animals out of her shells. she had thousands of shells. we would walk the beach collecting shells, sandollars, starfish, and whatever beachy thing we could find. we even joked that it was so hard to find good shells b/c gran had them all. gran also painted beautiful pictures. she loved bob ross and had every episode on video tape. she also had a thing for david hasselhoff and watched nightrider lol! she took sick when i was real little. had a stroke and actually died for several minutes. had it not been for dr. byron she wouldn’t have revived. he wouldn’t give up. i’m so glad. gran was a fighter. she was very sick and spent weeks in the hospital. i lived with an aunt during that time, my grandfathers sister. she made excellent corn bread, butter beans, and fried okra. then we would have a grapico float with bryers ice cream. i remember chasing her cats, playing in the storm cellar, and with her dog grinner. after gran got out of the hospital she lived with her daughter and learned to walk again. my aunt (let’s call her mawmaw from here out) told me today that gran was determined to get home to me. i’ve been told that my whole life. gran was sick but still took care of me. she couldn’t lift me, so she taught me how to climb on her hopsital bed to get my diaper changed. at least that is what i’m told. i don’t remember. gran was always determined to live to see me old enough to take care of myself, or until i had someone to care for me. she was sick my whole life. there were periods of time where she did really well. and then periods where she would be in the hospital 4 or 5 times in the year. i lived with my great-aunt then. gran was in the hospital when i started kindergarten. mawmaw got all of my supplies and took me the first day. i remember my mat was not like everyone elses. that bothered me. looking back i realize my mat had better padding than theirs. i should have appreciated that. i think gran got out of the hospital for some of that year. i do not remember much about where i lived then. i spent a lot of time with my great aunt though. gran started to stay well for longer periods of time. she still had to sleep in a hospital bed and have oxygen all the time. i always had to be careful not to step on her cord when playing in the house. for several years she was in and out of the hospital. my first two years of high school she did rather well. the last were more difficult for her. i always knew when she went into the hospital. my aunt would come check me out of school. i hated hearing my name on the intercom. i knew what it meant, but i never knew where i would live for the next few days. it was usually with my grandfather’s sister or grans sister. (never knew my grandfather btw.) i remember being in a practice room passing off music to my band director when i was a senior. gran was very sick that time. i couldn’t concentrate. i don’t remember how the conversation went, but i remember him telling me that i needed to prepare myself for the fact that she may die. that was the only time i can remember crying over a hospital visit or even thinking that she might not make it. she was in for the same thing everytime. congestive heart failure. pneumonia. complications of emphysema. sometimes her kidneys would stop working. they would give her medicine to shock them back into action again. she pulled through that time my senior year. i went off to college…met my husband. due to several concerns gran went to live with her daughter (mawmaw). i felt homeless. i wasn’t close with mawmaw at that time. she had taken care of me growing up and her and pawpaw were like parents to me. he actually took me for my drivers test…taught me how to parallel park on the way. but during my teen years and into college i dont know what happened, but i didnt feel like that was my home too. gran did well there for two years. i married at the end of my first year of college. gran met him and liked him, despite telling me i was insane when i told her my plans. i can remember gran being in the hospital some that first year of college. i went to stay with her once. how she ever got any sleep in the hospital i will never know. every hour a nurse would come in to check her vitals. i remember a nurse coming in once just to remind her to breathe. apparently when gran was asleep her body would sometimes forget necessities like breathing. the nurse would come in and say breathe ms. jones. that just struck me as funny. anyway, by the end of our first year of marriage i became pregnant. it was that summer that gran started staying sick again. by fall gran was back in the hospital and it was more serious than times previous. her kidneys stopped working. the hospital didnt have a dialysis machine. (i will refrain from frustrated rant, but WTH!) she went for 3 days in renal failure before being flown to another hospital. we drove and made it there b/f she got there. when they wheeled her in she looked horrible…bloated and a sick yellow color. they got her into ICU. they told us there was little hope for her and that she had little to no brain activity. since she squeezed my hand at this point i didn’t put much into that. my aunt told the doctors under no uncertain terms that they were NOT to speak like that in front of her. they got the dialysis started. that was cool to watch. as her blood ran through the machine her color began to change. the dialysis got her color back to normal and she came out of the coma the next day or so. still on a vent though. we lived about 2 hours away at that time, but i drove back and forth to the hospital as much as i could. we wanted someone at every ICU visit. sometimes on my visit i would just go sit in her room with a book. she would be in and out napping when she tired of talking. as long as i didn’t disturb her they let me stay in there for several hours. i remember her crashing once. that was very traumatic. we were talking and then her eyes showed fear and she kept mouthing i’m dying. the nurses came in i was upset but as long as we stayed out of their way they let us stay. they did close the curtain that time while they worked on her. alarms going off and they were trying to get her back. it worked. she was able to beat her body again. she got out of the hospital only to go back in early february. “froggy” was born late january. gran was not doing well so that first week i got permission to take the baby to see my gran in the hospital. i didn’t want to take the baby to the hospital, but i wanted gran to see her. gran counted her toes and asked “why’d ya name her that?” when we told her the name. gran made it out of the hospital yet again. she had to go to a care facility after that though. i took the baby to see her a few times. i wish more. gran went back into the hospital that may. my aunt told me today that she asked gran if she still wanted to fight. gran said “yep”. that was two days before she died. i went to visit the day before. i stood with my cousin. each of us holding a hand as we many times did. see, sometimes when gran was in a coma she would still squeeze our hands when we talked to her. she didn’t squeeze my hand this time. her body was shutting down. her blood pressure kept bottoming out, and her kidneys were again not working. they couldn’t shock them back either. nothing they did was working and the fluid was building up threatening her heart and lungs. i kissed gran goodbye and went home that night. my aunt called me, and i thought it was time. but it was only to ask my thoughts on a suggested invasive procedure. thinking back to gran not squeezing my hand i said no. it turns out the decision didn’t have to be made. the next day my aunt called. gran had passed away in the early hours of the morning.

gran died in 1997. i think about her often. for the longest i didn’t really grieve. one day i went to her grave site and just lost it. i spent about 30 minutes on my knees at the foot of her grave crying, wishing that her life had not been so hard. thankful for her taking care of me. she instilled in me a determination to set and reach goals, to not let anything stop me. i hope she would be proud of me. i wish she could know my youngest who is so much like her. gran would be amused by her charm and energy. it is her namesake and very fitting. it’s been 8 years since gran died. in that 8 years my aunt kept grans shell wall as gran had arranged it. my aunt took that down this month. i don’t know…that was just something gran had created and taking it down is sad. we still have all the shells and fish and such. but for me that ugly net with grans favorite shells and starfish was something special. for everyone else too, but it was time to redecorate. just sad to see it go.

she was a very special person. she didn’t make the best choices in life…and life for her was hard. but she fought hard too. she lived to see me grow up. and she lived long enough to see that djembe was a good man who would take care of me. she lived to see my first born. i’m glad she is no longer in pain, but i still want one more moment. a chance to say thank you.

we had a great time today at homestead hollow. the scenic route getting there was amazing. i LOVE the vibrant autumn colors and just haven’t seen it in Mississippi. there is something about being home. it just seems everything is more beautiful when you cross the state line into Alabama. the hills are rolling, there are more hardwood trees and less pine. i love being at home too. it’s great for the kids to spend time with their cousins. i enjoy the time with family as well. we like to sit around the kitchen drinking coffee and catching up. things have been so crazy the last year or so that i haven’t been able to come home as much as i would like. i hope that graduating this semester will change that. i would like to come home at least once a month. family is just so important.

on that note, i’m missing djembe. ~*~ hope you’re having fun dear!

i just finished an article observation on comprehensive chaos concerning teens of the 1950s and the generational conflicts they faced. according to the author teens of the 30s and 40s engaged in a promiscuous competition to maintain popularity and it is this competition that drove them to success. their conflict with 1950s teens was in the decline of this competition with the practice of going steady. the parents felt their was a social decline and a personal decline because of the changing practices of competition. just go read it and this will make a little more sense. anyway, here’s taking that thought a little further…if teens of the 30s and 40s were more promiscuous and therefore more competitive for success than their going steady teenagers of teh 1950s then i must conclude that teens of the current generation are going to be wildly successful. seriously, based on the conclusions that bailey proposes this is not a stretch of the imagination. (i know it was just bailey’s general analysis, but i’m going to run with this.) you see, teens of today have no problem with going steady. sure some do, but they are more sexually active than teens of ever before. and if the notes i take up are anything to go by they are a lot more creative. they sure as heck compete for the attention too. maybe there is hope for this generation. maybe their relationship competitions will pay off for them when they hit the reality of the world. of course they are spending more time concerned with appearance, things, and pop culture than they are with the educational resources that will make them successful in the real world, but still there is hope. maybe there is something to bailey’s analysis…i certainly found it an odd way to evaluate progress within society, but then social historians will study just about anything….

enough for tonight, i don’t think i’m making much sense at this hour anyway.

kontan jou

Article reference, “Rebels Without a Cause? Teenagers in the 1950s” by Beth Bailey in Major Problems in American History Since 1945

Bailey describes the 1950s as another gilded age stating, “Underlying and sometimes overwhelming both bravado and complacency were voices of uncertainty.” She also points out the concerns of social theorists that America’s success was destroying the values that made success possible. In other words, America is crumbling from within.

Bailey determines the issue of conflict is in defining the American dream. What was it? Success through individual competition in a free market system? Or was success the abundance the American marketplace made possible? The 1950s was a period of abundance, a period of convenience. The dream seemed to be changing. At the center of this changing dream was generational conflict.

Bailey proposes the dating choices of 1950s was the essence of societal decline, and generational conflict. Teens of the 1950s had a different expectation in their relationships and had a different system for defining popularity. Bailey first describes the rating and dating practices of the 1930s and 40s generations. Girls were to never be left with a single partner for more than once around the dance floor. Social success was determined by a system of rating and social competition. When at a dance it was insulting to not have someone “cut-in”. To be highly “rated” a girl must be seen with the “right” man in the “right” places. According to Bailey, they were to cultivate the impression of being in great demand.

By the 1950s, success defined by what Bailey describes as promiscuous popularity had changed to defined by a dependable escort, a “steady”. Going steady replaced the dating/rating system of the 30s and 40s. It was a strict relationship governed by regional practices. The boy must call the girl a certain number of times each week and they must have a specific number of dates. Each knew where the other was at all times. There were also tokens of the relationship, a letter sweater or ring.

This definition of popularity instigated a generational battle. Some opposition was over the increased intimacy of a steady relationship. Bailey proposes an even greater meaning. “To them [the older generation], going steady, with its extreme rejection of competition in favor of temporary security, represented all the faults of the new generation.”

I disagree that there was a severe decrease in competition. To be popular, to strive for popularity, requires an element of competition. It was still necessary to be seen with the right guy in the right places. Teens in the 1950s merely changed the outward symbol of successful competition.

apparently it is time to redo some things on kontan jou. on computers other than my laptop it seems that information is missing in the layout. that is odd. i love the colors of this layout, but maybe it is time for a winter scene. something to work on i guess.

djembe is away. :,( i miss him. he’s off doing interviews for his nascar show. at least his hobby can tie into his work. i hope he is having fun in texas. i’m also hoping that poor alli is not at home traumatized by being alone for the weekend. i took off to visit family. alli was stressed when i left. not only is furniture moved around but djembe had a suitcase out and then left…then we left. i left the radio on for company. maybe she won’t stress too bad.