Rhena Writes

Tag: education

  • My favorite season is the one I’m in.

    Daily writing prompt
    What is your favorite season of year? Why?
    View all responses

    So, right now, that means spring is my favorite season. In Maryland it already feels a bit more like summer, hot and humid, the constant threat of thunderstorms, even though we are still ten days or so away from the summer solstice. The minutes of sunlight are still piling up on each side of the day. School is still in session, but the community pools are open. It would be easy for me to get caught up in either looking forward towards summer break or backwards to the cooler days of spring during this time of transition. But I’m putting a great deal of effort into being in the season I’m in — weatherwise and otherwise.

    I learned a lesson about this just yesterday in my guitar lesson. I’ve been working the same piece of music for a while now — maybe as long as two or three months? — I’m not really sure. In any case, it’s been a challenging piece and the last few lessons, my teacher has worked with me with the same few trouble spots for a few weeks now. At the end of the lesson, she’s sent me off with some thoughts on how to work on those few measures. So at each practice, I will follow her suggestions and work on those few measures, practicing them over and over. And there certainly has been some improvement.

    And yesterday she called me out. “You’ve been working on these other parts of the piece, haven’t you?” indicating the lines and measures that we hadn’t started working on during my lessons yet.

    I laughed and wondered, “How did she know?“

    I confessed that I had been. She also teaches my daughter and she told me that I’m just like her. There’s probably some truth to that. But when I talked to my daughter about it, she said that she has some favorite parts to pieces of music that she just really enjoys playing and so she plays those parts over and over.

    That’s not what’s going on for me.

    As I explained to my guitar teacher, I have it in my head that there’s some sort of deadline or like a “test” at the end and I start to get worried that I’m not going to have covered or practiced that part of the piece.

    I know. There is no deadline. And that’s also exactly what I said to my teacher. “You’re type A,” she said.

    We both had a bit of a laugh over the whole thing. The whole thing forced to me to examine and articulate some of these ridiculous thoughts and ideas that underlie how I’ve been approaching practicing guitar. And it also made me realize that I present as a Type A personality. And I realize that this is a survival/ defense mechanism that I built up in school and probably in life in general. It’s that I always feel like if I’m not three steps ahead, then I’m three steps behind and slipping even faster.

    But in my heart of hearts, that’s not who I really am. It’s just how I’ve been presenting myself. It’s a coping strategy. I practiced those other sections of the music because I was worried I’d somehow be called upon to know the whole piece and I wouldn’t be prepared.

    All of this for an activity that I’m partaking in supposedly “for fun.”

    In the meantime, the few measures that my teacher suggested I practice aren’t really getting that much better. And the whole thing isn’t really that much fun. Or, at least, it’s definitely not as much fun as it could be if I just trusted the process. Just focus on the parts that my teacher told me to. No need to be a super student, to know the whole thing ahead of the class (by the way, there is no class, these are private lessons). I’ve been cramming all of the music into each week, each practice. And in this way of thinking, I’ve ended up not really knowing any of the music that well. I haven’t been giving each line, each measure, each note its space and time.

    I’d like to be able to tell you that since this lesson and commensurate change in attitude, I’ve picked up the guitar and the whole thing has come together. That’s not true. This isn’t some neat little lesson with a change of attitude and a happy reward at the end. In fact, I haven’t even picked up the guitar since yesterday’s lesson. In part because that’s part of the lesson too. I’m doing all of this for fun so I don’t need to practice just to “prove” something to myself. And I also don’t need to “over practice”. I practice once a day for thirty to forty-five minutes. When I’m done, I’m done, I move on to something else. I don’t fixate and obsess and try to perfect it all.

    So what does this have to do with my favorite season?

    Like I said, my favorite season is the one I’m in. And being able to say that means that I don’t spend a lot of time looking forwards or looking backwards at the other seasons, which will inevitably come in their due time. Just as those other parts of the music will get their due focus and attention in their time. In the meantime, I’ll just live in the moment, the season, the measure, the notes I’m in.

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    It’s Wednesday, which means that I’m going to include a brief summary of what I’ve been blogging about in this past week.

    Let’s begin with last Thursday where I answered the prompt about my dream chocolate bar, which ended up being an impossible one because what’s the point of dreaming if it doesn’t transcend reality?

    Friday was my shortest post yet about why I wouldn’t change my name.

    Next up, I revealed who I spend most of my time with. (MY answer was unsurprising.)

    I wrote about what I need to live a good life. And, again, not a surprising answer.

    My tagline in a list poem: Rhena, more than this poem.

    Lastly, yesterday I wrote about what luxury I couldn’t live without.

    A bit of silence. And then a discussion of why I shouldn’t actually feel awkward about speaking aloud by myself.

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  • Matt’s Bar in Minneapolis

    Daily writing prompt
    What is your favorite restaurant?
    View all responses

    Yesterday, my daughter showed me a meme. A girl with a shocked look on her face and the text: me at five when my mom told me she doesn’t have a favorite color. As my other daughter says: real.

    I’ve always thought that having favorites of things is a really funny topic of conversation. I remember being asked often through years of school about what my favorite things were. I suspect that the teachers were trying to connect to students, learn about their preferences at least and perhaps give them a little space to bring a bit of themselves into the classroom. At least, many years later, that was part of my motivation in asking these sorts of questions as a teacher in my own classroom. It’s strange that I didn’t remember all that was involved in answering seemingly simple questions.

    As a student, I remember that there were many dynamics involved in answering such questions in front of the whole class, especially if everyone was expected to answer in turn. If I repeat the same answer (blue was always popular as a favorite color), would those who gave the same reply ahead of me accuse me of “stealing” their preference? If I chose something different, would I be teased (brown, yellow, green, and pink being the colors of poop, pee, vomit/boogers, and girls respectively)? If I stepped too far out of the box (periwinkle? mauve? chartreuse) would I isolate myself?

    And perhaps answering a “favorite” question has become no less fraught in adulthood. Certainly, I cannot think of one favorite restaurant to answer this daily prompt. I have enjoyed and do enjoy a number of different places.

    So I guess that what I’ll answer is a spot that I miss going: Matt’s Bar in Minneapolis. When we lived there, we’d eat there once or twice a month even though the line for a table was often out the door even in frigid Minnesota winters. Like everyone else, we went there for the Jucy Lucy (yes, that is how it’s spelled), which is a burger with the cheese in the middle, meaning it was melty and molten hot. I had mine with pickles and both raw and fried onions and we’d get a basket of fries for the table. The ritual was to dig out a well-done fry and use it to poke holes in the burger to make it cool down faster. They always had decent beer on tap and the regular waitress always recognized us as regular neighbors. She sometimes even comped us the fries or a drink. It’s not the sort of place that can be recreated elsewhere. I’m pretty sure most of the flavor in the burgers comes from the decades-old well seasoned grill. I don’t think I could ever pick a favorite restaurant but Matt’s certainly ranks up there as a spot that holds a lot of my favorite memories.

  • Consistency, presence, and showing up.

    I was around a lot of shitty, oblivious people in high school. I’ve mentioned before that I went to an “elite” private school in Washington, DC alongside a mostly white student body taught by mostly white teachers and overseen by mostly white administrators in the white, wealthy part of a very, very Black city. To be admitted, I had to take a standardized test (similar to the SAT but for, you know, twelve year olds), write an essay, and do an interview. In the name of fostering a sense of community and equality, the school didn’t have class rankings, homecoming courts, valedictorian or the like. They didn’t need those things. Students had already shown a willingness to sacrifice our individuality, our passions, our very humanity in the name of academic excellence and the privilege of being there.

    It is only in retrospect that I can see what a messed up place that was, especially for young people with newly formed minds. I didn’t ever feel seen or noticed by teachers or adults (except for one male teacher who I thought maybe saw some academic potential in my until he made some lewd comments to me because OF COURSE). For the most part, I felt like I just sort of flew under the radar just kind of trying to make it through each semester, each week, each day.

    Except for on the volleyball team. It’s not that I was particularly good at it. But I enjoyed it. I looked forward to going to the gym each day after school and playing. I looked forward to time with my teammates.

    This is primarily because I had a really good coach. I realize that it may seem like the bar was really low given the, you know, sexual harassment from other adults. But what I’m trying to give you a sense of is that to create a space where a young woman feels comfortable enough in her body to be able to enjoy herself within the larger culture of sexual harassment is no small feat. But Coach showed up everyday and was present for us. She wasn’t one of the showier or flashier teachers around there. She wasn’t loud or brash like some were. She was even and consistent and encouraging. She didn’t make me feel like I had to sacrifice in order to be successful or even good at the sport. She figured out where I excelled and encouraged me in that.

    It might surprise no one that she was also the only Black woman who I had in the role of a teacher or coach. Yes. For my entire four years. In the Blackest city in the country at the time. It’s one thing when an institution lacks diversity. It’s an entirely other thing when that institution is located on an island in a sea of diversity. There’s some pretty willful pushing people off of the island when that’s the case. These places don’t just “happen”. There’s an intention behind it. And that intention is white supremacy.

    It was a hard place for a biracial (not Black) girl to be everyday. But I can’t even begin to imagine the sacrifices my coach made in order to show up in that setting every day. And it’s only now, many years later as a grown adult that I can even begin to appreciate what a difference her doing so made in my life. You never know whose life you’re changing.