Procrastinating at Report Card Time

I'm supposed to be writing report cards - or more accurately, End of Year reports.  Important stuff, and I take them seriously (sort of), but I'm just not into it.  I've been agitated about a lot of stuff lately.

Cupcake's mother, for example, is trying to guilt trip me into socializing with them.  Occasional obligations are okay - like Cupcake's graduation from Swedish Massage school last week.  I was delighted to attend the ceremony and celebrate her accomplishment, but there was no way I was going to dinner with her whole family.  If it had just been Cupcake's immediate family, that would have been okay - but her father's brother was going to be there with his wife and kid and there's been resentment brewing between Cupcake's dad and his brother for some time.

No way was I taking a front row seat to drunken family dysfunction when I was stressing over work.  I'm not so stressed about work anymore - but I'm not going to talk about work on the internet given that I already got fired from one job for revealing my true feelings in blogland.  The work drama has mellowed out for the time being, but now I'm contemplating what kind of business I would have if I started my own business.   Last summer, it occurred to me that Gigi and I should set up some kind of service where we counsel single dads about parenting stuff.  I figured that if I were somehow fated to continually find myself mixed up with men going through divorce shit, I might as well make it into a business.

The last day of school is June 7th, and even though I'll be working all summer running the little day camp, I'm transitioning to my activist self effective next weekend.   I'm going to go help my friend the pineapple head with a kids' event down at the Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space (MoRUS).  We're making musical instruments out of recycled materials.  I'll be going out to see a performance by a children's dance company, Experimental Dance Group, which a dear friend of Pineapple Head's developed.  He's a dancer and educator.

As it happens, my good buddy Nicole, of the I Love Nicole Show, is going to be singing with a new band next Friday night and that's on the Lower East Side, too.  So once I get these report cards off my neck, I can start thinking about what to wear and worrying about losing the five pounds I gained between Spring Break in Texas, the road trip with Mom and all those meals in good restaurants during Woody's Birthday Weekend.

I really am bummed about those five pounds.  It all started when I fell off the gluten free wagon down in Texas.  I was fairly mindful, but once you start eating foods you're supposed to avoid, cravings kick in and everything goes rapidly down hill.   Five pounds is no big deal, but looking at the scale every morning, I realize that I really do feel like my value as a human being is tied to the number on the scale

Intellectually, I know I am more than a number on a scale - but I swear there's the tiniest hint of jowl just starting to show up on the corners of my mouth.  It's alarming.  I'm back on the gluten and dairy free wagon and increasing my activity level by walking home from work, so I could very well lose all five pounds by Friday.  Or three anyway, and that's enough to get read of the jowl action.

Although I am concerned about my looks because of the man issue, I'm also nervous because I have to have pictures taken next weekend.  Joe needs some new photos for Worldwide Hippies News & Stuff. I'm scheduled to start turning in my two minute segments to Joe after Punk Patriot is here for Left Forum.  I'll surely need pictures taken at Left Forum - maybe even with somebody famous like Noam Chomsky.   In any case, there's no room for jowls in my life especially when I'm fixing to be splashed all over the internet again.

Years ago, when I was still married and when Max was still doing hair full time, Max and I were talking about my hair one day before a color and cut.  I told Max that I wanted to be a cool old lady with a long, gray braid.  At the time, I was a long way from being a cool old lady, and my hair still has a ways to grow before I'll have a long braid.  For the moment, I don't feel like an old lady either.  I wish I could be like this woman in the French Revolution, only with my clothes on

I'm pretty jazzed about giving focus and attention to my activist self.  Who knows?  I might even meet a man.  In any case, I'm going to commit to a fearless summer both politically and romantically.  Fearless Summer is name of a partnership of environmental groups, "a movement against extreme energy."  Tim DeChristopher's group Peaceful Uprising is one of the partners.

I doubt I'll be charging into a battle shouting, "Liberté, égalité, fraternité!"  I hang out in a community garden making music with little kids and cook for the emerging generation when they're working on the revolution.  Either way, though, I shouldn't be thinking of myself as an old lady with a long gray braid any more than I should be making plans for Access-A-Ride.

I'm not going anywhere until I finish writing these dang report cards, though.

Fearless Summer (wearefearlesssummer.org)
Summer Heat (joinsummerheat.org)