VWrite Update & Some Selfish Feel Good News

So, anyone who volunteers knows that the only reason to volunteer is a selfish one: to make yourself feel really good.

But the good and wonderful people at Open Books, where I've been volunteering, have gone above and beyond making me feel good and have named me their November "Vol-Star," which is a huge honor for me. You can read about it on the Open Books Tumblr page.

But when I got the e-mail from them, I realized that I'd neglected to write a post about the college visits I went on with Angelica, my mentee in the VWrite program, so this seemed like perfect timing.

Last month, Angelica and I took a campus tour of Columbia College Chicago, where she's interested in going after she graduates in 2014. She's thinking about studying television and movie directing, but she was also really interested in the music program they have at the college.

Getting some tour tidbits from our guide (who may be on Saturday Night Live in the near future...)

Angelica, in the music performance theater

Why, hello. Yes, I'll be going here soon.

After the tour, Angelica and I went to say hi to the Bork parents since they were so close. My mom thought Angelica was "adorable," which was not surprising, and after a chat we took a picture on the deck.

But our collegiate visits weren't over; Angelica was embarking on Gage Park's fall break, so the first Monday she had off school, she came with me to MCC. She'd visited the campus with me before, but I'd forgotten to take any pictures. I didn't make the same mistake this time.

Angelica, looking super studious in the MCC library

We had a great time, and it was so much fun to show her off to my colleagues. And my students in the Monday class (17 male/3 female) were also very excited to meet her. The boys may have showed off a bit on her behalf; they were a lot chattier than usual--and they're usually unbelievably chatty.

Angelica and I are almost through the official VWrite program--it's just one semester--but we've decided that it would be weird to not see each other anymore. We decided this over noodles at Urban Belly the other weekend (she really wanted to try traditional ramen and I didn't need my arm twisted to go with her).

Us, in front of giant bowls of noodles and some wrinkle beans, which were good but even more fun to say. WRINKLE BEANS!

You can't see it, but she's enjoying the delicious ginger candy they gave us after dinner

A. showed me the "good" way to take a picture of yourself: from above

We have a VWrite potluck after Thanksgiving, and then we made plans to get some crepes later that week. It's probably meaningful that many of our outings revolve around food. It means that we like food (mystery solved). We did decide that the post-crepe get together would be to work on her job applications, so there will be some work done. But we'll probably have to work on her applications over some cookies. Or banana splits.

All in all, working with Open Books and Angelica in this program has been a terrific experience. And if any of you are interested in volunteering, you should check out what they've got to offer (which is a lot).

Have a wonderful, turkey, potato, stuffing, and pie filled Thanksgiving!

College Sticks

In October Trevor had an unofficial reunion of his Columbia College pals. The weekend coincided with the Expo Chicago art fair, and friends came in from New York, North Carolina, and Alaska. And, of course, Chicago.

Our friend Adam, who lives in Fairbanks, came in on Friday and stayed with us for the weekend, and on Saturday we started the day at Navy Pier for the art fair.

We saw some pretty good stuff, though not everything wanted to be touched as much as this thing did

T and Adam walking and talking

On the #66

After we were arted out, we went to Martha and Jeremy's place, where the actual reunion festivities were going down. We had a barbecue, a bonfire, and lots of good art and non-art related conversation.

Some of the gang in the backyard: T taking the picture, Jason, Kyle, Jen, and Adam at the grill

What's up?

Me and Kate

Jeremy and Martha at the bonfire, where we spent the best parts of the night (which included a thirty minute stint of us trying to guess the punchlines to Kate's jokes [some dirty, some not]). I laughed until my stomach hurt.

Kate and Adam doing...yoga?

Now, we had a great weekend and Trevor was able to catch up with people he doesn't get to see that often. They talked and laughed about their time at Columbia, and told hilarious stories about each other and some of their friends who couldn't make it for the weekend. But what really hit home for me was how much of an impact their college years had on them.

Most everyone in their crowd is doing something related to photography or design. They've all continued to be creative people in many aspects of their lives (although Kyle doesn't formally shoot, he's a husband, the father of two girls, and he's doing social outreach, so he's a whole different kind of creative). Watching and listening to them was inspiring and hopeful. They'd bonded as friends and as artistic peers, and the work they made and learned about during school has stuck with them.

The college where I teach has a dramatically different environment than Columbia's, and the students I teach in my gen. ed. composition classes will never quite have the bond that other classes--those within a student's major--would have. But sometimes I get an inkling that my class has stuck with my students. That comes more frequently in my creative writing students--in July I wrote a post about a painting one of my spring creative writing students gave to me, and this past Friday I received an e-mail from a student in that same class who wanted to update me with pictures of her new baby (she was pregnant during our class) and thank me for helping her and pushing her writing.

But today I got an e-mail from a student I'd had last spring in a composition 2 class. That class focuses around source-based writing and I have my students read Columbine by Dave Cullen, which is a thoroughly researched, wonderfully written, but horrifying book about the 1999 massacre at Columbine High School. And my student, who is a soldier now stationed in Afghanistan, was, on his off time (I can't imagine what "off time" consists of in Afghanistan, but it's certainly different from my off time, sitting on the couch watching The Ring and drinking hot chocolate), browsing through the news and came across an article about the new book Far From the Tree by Andrew Solomon. The article focuses on an interview Solomon had with Sue Klebold, the mother of one of the Columbine H.S. shooters, and my student saw it, remembered our class, and "just thought [he] would share."

Now, is this the same as inspiring a conversation of ten former students as they sit around a bonfire, ten years after graduation, waxing nostalgic and artistic? No. But it's what I've got and it made me pretty happy.

Playing Catch-Up

Yes, it's been a month since our last post. So this is me, playing catch-up.

But zombies are slow to catch up. They're slow at everything.

I went to school on Halloween dressed up like a zombie. I didn't take the train like this; I drove instead and wore big sunglasses to hide my really gross make-up. My students were doing a peer-review so they didn't have to listen to me very much; I'm glad because they were so weirded out by my appearance that they wouldn't have been able to pay attention.

One of my students also dressed up for the Pride Club's Halloween costume contest. Here she is, flying through the air in the Commons.

Hermione, casting a spell; Supergirl, flying; Rosie the Riveter, flexing

Halloween night I met up with Bo and his parents for some trick-or-treating. He was a lion--the cutest one ever--but he refused to wear his hat so he's a headless lion. Still cute, though.

I'm so cute! Even without my lion hat!

Why is my auntie trying to eat me? Oh. She's a zombie.

After Bosco-treating, we went to the Power place to hang out with Sadie and her parentals. Sean did their house & lawn up with Halloween fantasticness. It was scartastic. Terrifyic. Really cool.

Sean got a video of those zombie shadows and a projector to put them in the window. A. Maze. Ing.

Sadie was done with her tricks and treating by the time we got there, but we all still got to hang out and eat dinner with her for a while until she went to bed. She showed us a seriously great dance move she learned in dance class: it involves her hopping onto one foot. She rocked it.

The weekend before Halloween, Trevor and I went up to Door County to hang out with Grandma and Grandpa Madel. It wasn't Albie's first trip up there, but doesn't he look adorable?

Albie = Adorable

We got to spend Saturday night with Grandma's book club, the Mysterians. A mystery writer named Bryan Gruley was in town from Chicago for the weekend to do some readings at the local Door County libraries, and one of the Mysterians was hosting a cocktail party for him on Saturday. The party was a lot of fun, and all of Grandma's Mysterian friends, and Bryan and his wife, were gracious and interesting. And Bryan was so gracious that he implied he might be willing to come talk to my creative writing club. I will begin harassing him about this soon. I also started reading his first novel, Starvation Lake, but the copy was Grandma's so I only got through the first dozen pages. I'm going to get my own copy soon.

The view from Grandma and Grandpa's place

Trevor, sneaking around in the stacks at Untitled Used Books

I'll have more news later (sooner than a month..)!

VWrite Goes Theatrical

If you read our post from last month, you know that I'm part of the Open Books VWrite mentoring program this year, and I'm mentoring a fantube-ular girl named Angelica, who's a junior at Gage Park High School.

On Friday night, Angelica and I went on an adventure to see the play Black Watch, which was brought here as part of the Chicago Shakespeare Theater's World's Stage program. I still have some connections at CST from when I worked there 1,000 years ago, and there was a secret discount (not really secret, but I'm trying to feel special) for the Black Watch shows last week. I snagged some half-price tickets and Angelica and I played it fancy for the night.

Well, not too fancy. This is where we ate dinner.

And no, it wasn't fancy. But it was deeeelicous.

The show wasn't at the CST main stage on Navy Pier, but at the Broadway Armory in Uptown. It was the perfect place for such a militaristic play.

Angelica outside of the house (gymnasium)

Our seats

The view from our seats, before the play began

Obviously we couldn't take pictures during the show, and thank goodness. We needed all of our attention focused on the ninety-five minute action and emotion-packed drama that was unfolding on the floor. The ten-man cast was excellent, and the scenery, music, and special effects were heart poundingly fantastic. If you want to see a very mild taste of what we saw, check out this video of the cast rehearsing.

And what was even more exciting than watching the actors march as the Black Watch soldiers do, was Angelica's commentary on their skills after the play. She was in the ROTC for a year and knows her marching stuff, so her critique was informative and expert.

Angelia, outside of the Armory

Mentor and Mentee, on the town

After the play, we needed to debrief, so we went to get some refreshments at Margie's Candies. I'd never been there before (which is insane. absolutely insane), so I was thrilled she'd suggested it.

And it was the perfect after-play treat.

Um, that's a lot of ice cream.

So we both finished the night full of culture, new ideas about the weeks ahead, and sugar. Lots and lots of sugar.

This upcoming Saturday we're going on a campus tour of Columbia College, so there will be more pictures. Until then, get tickets to Black Watch and then get some ice cream. It won't be with me and Angelica, but it will still be pretty good.

Why Our Nieces and Nephew Are the Cutest

Why are our two nieces and nephew the cutest?

Please. You don't even need to ask.

Hi, I'm adorable.

Now hold on there. I'm pretty cute, too.

Well, I can drive a car and vote for the next president of these United States. And I got an "A" on my English paper. So I win. For realz.

(And thanks to Paula and Sean for the fantastic pictures of Bo and Sadie. I will thank myself for the picture of Destiny. "Thank you, Laura." "Well, Laura, that's so nice of you to say. You're welcome.")

Michigan, For the First Time

This weekend Trevor visited Michigan for the first time in his entire life. It was monumental.

Well, maybe not monumental, but it sure was a lot of fun.

Greg and Paula got a lake house recently in Michigan and T. and I went up (and over) to spend the weekend with them, Bosco, and the elder Borks. It was a quick drive for a day and a half of gorgeous sun-filled Michigan.

On Saturday the seven of us took a tour to some of the local wineries. Bo was our designated driver since he's more of a whiskey man.

A picture with a cardboard monk

The gorgeous family

Vineyards

But we didn't only tour wineries. We had to get some substance in our bellies, so we went to the Chocolate Garden and had a tasting before buying some real food. Like cayanne pepper and dark chocolate truffles, and drinking chocolate mixes. You know: real food.

Dad Bork, using a refined writing instrument to fill out his chocolate tasting ticket

T., checking out the Michigan he's been missing all these years

After tooling around all afternoon, we all got a little sleepy--some of us more than others.

So we headed back to the lake house to rest up before dinner.

A panoramic shot off the back deck (with T.'s new iPhone!)

Down to the beach

Hi!

And then Greg and Trevor got the grill going for dinner (not chocolate truffles, but it was still good).

T. on the back deck

Greg at the grill

We had a little time to play while dinner was cooking, and Bo showed off his excellent conversation skills for the camera.

He may not say a lot of English words yet (although no, yes, boat, mama, no, sit here, no, help me, watermelon, and no are all in his wheelhouse), but he sure has style!

After dinner we played a lively round of Trivial Pursuit and although the men kind of won by a little bit (or maybe by twice as many pie pieces, but whatever), the ladies were amazing and would have won if it hadn't been so late. That's right. We lost because we were tired.

The girls were pretty tired, too, although they pretended for a while.

We're UP!

And, we're down

And we all slept like exhausted chihuahuas until this morning when Greg woke us up with a delicious egg breakfast.

The weekend was tons of fun and we're looking forward to making many more visits to the lake house over the years (especially to make use of Greg & Paula's new boat and wave runner).

And then we drove home and, after unpacking I promptly fell into a nap. For three hours. And if you think I won't be able to sleep tonight, you'd be sorely mistaken. Sorely.

(this is a picture from last week during T.'s Columbia College Reunion--another post on that will be coming soon)

Goodnight.

VWrite!

During our last post I mentioned that I was going to be a part of a mentoring program through Open Books, a non-profit literacy center here in Chicago. Well, on August 29, I drove down to south side Gage Park High School for a meet-and-greet with the junior class that our group is mentoring. And I got to meet my mentee, a very cool girl named Angelica. There were tons of pictures from that night, so check them out on the Open Books Flickr page.

Angelica (who, I am thrilled to report, is excited about our blog and will be writing an Archipelago guest blogger very soon) is pretty snap-tastic. Here are some of the things I learned about her:

• She's lived in Puerto Rico and Florida as well as in Chicago
• She's in the drama club and might want to study theater in college
• She loves to read manga and watch anime
• She has made many a hair-dying experiment
• Her family owns a restaurant in Humboldt Park

There's so much more, but I'm going to wait for her to talk about herself for herself.

Because of the Chicago Teachers Union strike, CPS has been out of school, so that means that Angelica and her classmates have been a bit at loose ends. She's been hanging out with her friends a lot, but I invited her to come to my school with me last Friday to give her something fun to do (and by something "fun" I mean road tripping out to McHenry County and hanging out in my English class. She was overwhelmed with fun. Seriously. Flabbergasted by Fun.)

Well, we did have a terrific time. The trip out there was great. We ate donuts and listened to Angelica's iPod, which is full of hip young-people-music that she had to constantly explain to me (very patiently, I may add). I now have a very long playlist to investigate. She was, no surprise, also great in my class. She talked to some of my students about the assignment they were turning in, and she got to ask them what they thought of the school. She listened and watched the students do their group MLA documentation presentations (and if that's not raw excitement, I don't know what is), and then while they took a quiz she started to read the book our class is reading, Columbine by Dave Cullen. In fact, she got through more than fifty pages of it in about an hour. She is obviously a bookworm, which is just one of the reasons I like her so much.

After my class was over I took her on a campus tour, but I completely forgot to take any pictures, which really stinks because we went to the green house, the auto lab, the book store, the library, and about ten more places that would have been great photo-ops. So, close your eyes and picture her there.

I did remember, though, to snap a picture of her after we ate some lunch in downtown Crystal Lake. I think she was kind of in awe of what was considered a "down town." And I mean that she thought it was quaint and adorable and she could fit it in her pocket.

Angelica in front of the clock in downtown CL

This week, the Gage Park kids are still out of school (though here's hoping to classes resuming mid-week!), and I'm hoping to talk or e-mail with Angelica soon to make more plans. We've got to schedule a visit to Columbia College in the city and we've got to talk about the book we're reading together, City of Bones by Cassandra Clare. In fact, if we have time this semester, we're going to read all three of the books from Clare's Mortal Instruments series.

But for now, you can look through the Flickr pictures and look forward to a post from guest author, student extraordinaire, and possible future theater producer, Angelica!

Back to School

It's already week three of the Fall 2012 semester (holy cow!) and I'm mostly in the swing of things; although my body is still waffling between a bright, shiny, energetic morning wake-up two minutes before my 5:15 a.m. alarm, and a soggy, sleepy wake-up, where my body resists and acts like a wet sack of flour until 8:30 a.m. when I'm dragging myself off the train to make the last couple of miles trek to campus.

Last week we had a student organization fair and I was there to recruit new members for our creative writing club, Writer's Block. Our wonderful group has been around for about four years, but last May, most of the steady members either transferred to four-year colleges or graduated. So although we're almost starting from scratch, I'm happy to say that we've got an excellent and promising new crew of about eight students. Here are some pictures from the organization fair where I tried to entice them with candy and an adorable stuffed penguin:

Dr. Thomas with some of the Dance Team gals--they remind me of when I was a high school cheerleader, so I had to include them (Photo Courtesy of MCC and the Office of Marketing and Public Relations)

Me and Donna, my former student/current Writer's Block member & club Secretary/OMPR writer (Photo Courtesy of MCC and the Office of Marketing and Public Relations)

Frank, my former student and president of the Drama Club (Photo Courtesy of MCC and the Office of Marketing and Public Relations)

So, that's the start of the year. Currently, all of my students are terrific and they seem to still like me (or at least they are still laughing at my awful jokes [although they haven't gotten any formal grades yet, so their attitudes might still change...]).

I've also started mentoring a terrific high school student through the Open Books VWrite mentorship program, so stay tuned for more on that. And happy September!

There's a New Guy in Town

So, do you remember our last post a couple of weeks ago recounting the baby shower for Julie and Jeremy? Well, four days after that party, Julie had the baby! Talk about perfect timing. Here he is on the day he was born:

Hello!

His name is Max and he's pretty adorable. He was two weeks early but was born a perfect weight and only made his poor mother go through twenty-one hours of labor. That had better be the last misbehaving he does for the rest of his life.

Here he is leaving the hospital:

My legs are so skinny!

Trevor and I went to J & J's place on Monday to visit the new family member, and I must say, he's pretty much the cutest little dude in the city. On our way over we came up with some good nicknames for him, but our favorite is "Maxie Five Cents": he will be a gangster who gives people a piece of his mind before punching them in the noodle with his five-fingered fist. Also, it's "five cents" because his last name is Nickels, and we think puns are hilarious.

I'm gonna give you a piece of my mind, see...

So congratulations to Julie and Jeremy, and welcome to the world, Max!