Goldfinch

Sideshows

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 13:12:00 +0000

I've had some e-mail prickings (submission windows closing and direct invites, etc.) that have led me down a few side streets during this novel rewrite. Last week I rewrote the story that was a finalist for Glimmer Train and resubmitted it to three places. I'm finishing up an essay for this invitation.
I'll recommend this book to anyone!

My novel will make good progress before the end of the month. The ambitiousness of the project expands every time I write it. Imagine writing a book about your racial identity, now imagine including your eating disorder history, now imagine setting it in Africa, giving it two narrators and many people and places that would really like to keep their anonymity. Ironically, the trick to all this is to not think about it while writing it. There is no way you can produce anything that does more than touch an certain aspects of all these topics. The trick is to do justice to the aspects you "choose"

Writing? YES!

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 21:23:00 +0000

It's moving! Thank God I'm writing again. That's all I can ask . . .that I don't stare at the screen and hate myself and
wish I didn't have this writerly compulsion that brings moodiness, joy, dejection, and happiness. OK, the one emotion being a writer does NOT create in me is apathy. Is that an emotion though? Is that like debating whether white is a color?

Meanwhile, my impending move to New Zealand yields google results such as
this one

How's the Writing Going?

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 14:09:00 +0000

Generating words has never been a problem. Perhaps the "problem" is that this particular manuscript has already been held by a publisher for a period of time before rejection -- meaning that its well past the insulated pupae stage and more like a winged thing uncomfortably turning around inside a chrysalis. What I have, right now, is 9K words "on deck" and 70+K words in another file waiting to be filtered and attached as I move through with my fine comb. The book was nonfiction for so long that I have to remind myself where I now have liberties . . .like learning the way to key a sticky lock and suddenly having the lock changed. I've also split the narrator into two people. One is a third-person voice and the other a first-person. The implication is that they are the same person. A reader can choose why such a division exists, but each carries a very different voice.

This is my last week working all 7 days at some job or the other. It's also the first week when my New Zealand trip feels 'real'so I get distracted by trying to do lots of little things to prepare for leaving the country.

The Span of Imagination

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Sat, 31 May 2008 14:45:00 +0000

Without pulling punches I will be running a "JuNoReWriMo" (without caps that reads Junorewrimo) as reported on this blog. I have a novel that begs for rewriting. My month's goal is 80K--completely doable as the invisible back-work of my hippocampus has been computing all this for months. It's already June 1 in New Zealand, so here goes--

More on process

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Tue, 20 May 2008 13:31:00 +0000

While I'm dealing with reality, I need to acknowledge that for me to write personally satisfying work, work that makes me full, corrects my sense of schism, and (from the few accolades I've accrued) is good, I need to drop down to this very obsessive place and then stomp around in it. I don't in anyway believe that writers and good artists require this kind of unhealthy tremble to create. I don't think good writers need to be alcoholics, Emos, or on medication. But I have, in partnering with someone who is so much more 'on the table' about things found that letting the natural process FOR ME take over appears very, very distressful when viewed by someone with a different creativity.

Still, once I'm "inside" a piece it all irons out. But I'm not great company when I'm writing. OK, at moments I am, but I'm disengaged from a lot of things and people.

Who we are

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Sun, 18 May 2008 16:38:00 +0000

I haven't hidden much on this blog, though I bounce between funny observations from my daily chaos and soulful renditions of my spiritual health. It's finally ocurred to me that that is my true character: this fragile, cataclysmic, emotional creature, and a jester-like reporter of prickled happines. People like me sometimes earn some non-complimentary terms: unstable, emotionally immature, suffereing Peter Pan syndrome, from poor impulse control, and other caustic and unhelpful descriptors. It can be difficult to remember that everyone who does (or might) use such phrases does so because they wish--in some way--for the freedom to be the type of child I remain. No one has called me names recently. But I feel dealing with truth is more effective than sheilding one's eyes and trying to live otherwise. Kindly spoke, I have an artistic and affective temperament.

There are some young teenagers in my life who are entering the whirlwind course of high school/parental/societal pressures. These are children on whom great hopes are pinned. They are their parent's reasons and redemption. They are tasked with doing what we "failed" to do ourselves. No matter how it is communicated and assured, they know. They carry with them the undone and the unborn. Here, in these developed countries especially, while we say we want them only "to be happy" this is no more true than the idea that college is "years away"--it is true as it is said, and untrue as it is lived. What we risk in this translation with these children is that they "fail" on both counts. They never accomplish what we truly gave them as tasks, and they never find how to create happiness and self-satisfaction in their lives.
What will it take to give them the freedom we truly want to? First, be truthful with ourselves, then forgive ourselves, then set ourselves free.

Foundling

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Fri, 16 May 2008 14:18:00 +0000

Some writers consider the rewriting of a draft the most enjoyable part, and I'll admit that some of those "AHA!" moments in terms of narrative arc, voice, and plot come together are thrilling, but I currently sit among the memories and detritus of three separate book manuscripts. They're all ambitious works. But "Foundling" is the one that needs to be finished first. Sure, I've been busy . . .that makes a marvelous excuse. But let's take stock of what this particular book is about and why it's caused such anxiety and growing pains. 1) It's about racial identity, particularly mine 2)It's about class structure 3)It involves writing the emotional truth about people still living 4)It involves revealing myself in my least admirable era, something akin to those 'naked dreams' everyone has had . . .

So why write it? My answer is in the last three words "everyone has had . . ." And besides, people love reading about train-wrecks. And God knows we need some openers for frank discussion about race and class and love and humanity. I think I'll do it.

Currently reading this book which I think I would've benefitted more from had I read it five or six years ago. It would be intersting to read it alongside this one if we are really to discuss the "landscapes of Western minds".

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Wed, 07 May 2008 22:32:00 +0000

I read this classic book by Eric Carle to my morning group of preschoolers who'd never read it before. Even with their limited attention spans they loved it. The afternoon group is just a little older and most of them had read it before. To enrich the experience for them I like to stop and ask questions while reading. The hungry caterpillar hatches from an egg on a leaf in the moonlight. I asked "What else hatches from eggs?" knowing they'd just finished studying farm animals. The loudest boy in the room shouted "SHEEP!"

Imagine . . .oh, I wish it were true!

Caution

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Tue, 06 May 2008 14:52:00 +0000

It's really hard not to raise an eyebrow when you get an e-mail from a government 'animal health' agency that begins "We are pleased to inform you that this week's disease information is listed at . . ." You can go to this web clearinghouse and see every foot-and-mouth-avian-influenza-and-on-and-on outbreak from India to Botswana. How did I get on this e-mail list you may ask? In my application frenzy two months ago I signed up to be part of the on-call "elite special force" (another phrase that elicits a hard blink)for these sorts of things. I actually took a Saturday and did some online FEMA training. I wonder if the gov is reading my blog. I wonder if my economic stimulus kickback will arrive now.

Meanwhile, I'm avidly reading Narrative of the Life Of Frederick Douglass. It was originally published in May of 1845. The literate portion of American society had not yet taken up reading the novel; instead, they were enamoured of reading an embellished form of 'autobiography' that would make that million tiny pieces guy seem honest. To verify his story, Douglass mailed a copy of his manuscript to his former master .

And new life for old tires, as you see here, doesn't look pretty yet but should service well. Here is an example of raised bed gardening. The soil temperature stays warmer longer, the soil environment is more managed with compost and weed shields, and--once things grow--is has a kind of aesthetic to it. I'm not yet sure what kind of aesthetic. . .
I also planted giant sunflowers against the wall. We'll see how they do. Nice to know I drove from Alaska to Upstate NY on these tires and back and now they'll grow me some vegetables.

Today's funnies

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Mon, 05 May 2008 19:53:00 +0000

The Feed Store marquee sign today says "Mothers' Day Sale: 15% off all cattle prods and electric fencing"

The Chinese geese goslings have figured out how to unscrew their brooder heat-bulb with their beaks. At first I couldn't figure out why that light was out each day and always loose in its socket. While I was there for several hours yesterday I caught them in the act. They haven't fledged out yet, but I guess they're warm enough. Or perhaps this is their "rage against the machine" for their poultry brethren down the road under the heat lamps at KFC.

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Sun, 04 May 2008 04:40:00 +0000

I will correspond with this man before my chance closes. Before we lose him, too.

Ride your yak to work

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Sun, 04 May 2008 01:48:00 +0000

Bring your yak to work day could become a national event. I suggest we put Nerf(TM) soccer balls on the tips of their horns. They're really only dangerous when they're scratching the sides of their faces on you . . .

Next Sunday I'll be--finally!-- going out to Sawmill Creek Ranch in Delta to see my friend's herd and tame a few calves down. With gas prices as they are I'm considering commuting on one as well.

See other blog today

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Sat, 03 May 2008 00:03:00 +0000

Grammar Beef

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 22:38:00 +0000

I'm the last person who's (notice the CONTRACTION) allowed to criticize anyone for their grammar, but the recent run on plural nouns punctuated as possesive makes me NUT'S!! (haha)
Meanwhile, those inquiring minds that asked what Polish chicks look like as adults can check here or here depending on how inspired you felt by yesterday's post.

Chicken Saddle

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 04:03:00 +0000

No, it's not for Barbie(TM) to ride the ol' gal but this chicken saddle will spare her dorsal feathers . . .

Over dinner this evening we were discussing that the local ice cream stand "Hot Licks" has opened for the season. The other seasonal venue across the street is called "Bun on the Run" (cinnamon rolls). Of course, "Bun" is operated out of a kiosk in the Beaver Sports parking lot. So within fifteen walking feet are three local businesses worth punning yourself into a corner over. Steamed milk almost came out of Alexander's nose when we decided that Hot Beaver Bun Licks would cover all the bases.

Now Reading

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 00:25:00 +0000

1. For my current farmophilia: This book is proof that one doesn't need excellent plotting or exemplary subject matter to create a masterpiece. And remember, "every single skein of wool the whole world 'round begins with a sweaty person and pissed off sheep [shearing]".

2. For social justice: Tim Wise is kindred. We read Affirmative Action as the final book in the FNSB School District's "diversity book club" (and how I've come to loathe that overused, trumped-up, self-satisfied term 'diversity'). If we really, actually believed that POC are no less smart and capable as whites then we would not have silently taken part in an educational system and economy that doesn't represent POC in percentages equivalent to that of the general population. Why aren't more blacks in med school, college, whatever? Either you choose to believe they are incapable, or you choose to "believe" that institutional racism is real. Stop thinking it's the other white guy who's messing up here, folks. And get past the guilt and pandering 'color blindness' cowpies you keep stepping in.

3. For inner dreamscape needs: Antarctic Navigation

Imagine opening a shipment box filled with these (P.S.and a life update)

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 14:08:00 +0000

I worked with a fun, gregarious fellow last year who called the one adult Polish Crested chicken we had at Overlook "Eighties Rockstar Chicken". Unfortunately, the day we moved the 26 goats and kids to a new pen the crazy chicken was trampled to death. It was my day off that day, I remember that. Anyway, the chick barn at Alaska Feed is almost completely full, and I'm also enjoying some hours on the weekends where I am the unofficial 'poultry info, petting zoo, and chick packaging moderator'--able to i.d. a gosling breed from six feet away while rescuing banty chicks from an untimely death-by-drowning in the water dish. I've asked for higher management responsibilities in this company and The Big Boys are still navel-gazing and wondering "where did SHE come from?" while reading a barrage of recommendation letters from my wonderful friends and staring at my resume. The manager they may or may not replace is great to work with and he believes in me. The Big Boys just need some time, I think. In the meantime I accepted a summer position with the Fairbanks Borough as a 'Summer Youth Supervisor' at Pioneer Park. I get a running crew of young men and women in our city's "Alaska Disneyland" where major public events are held throughout the season. It should be fun. It's not even three miles of my house. Alaska Feed is a ten minute walk from my house. I just got a bike and my commutes are minutes long.

I won't be going to graduate school at UAF this fall. Instead, I'll be getting a dairy science certificate through University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign through their distance ed program. It's sad that until recent years I felt that all things exciting, interesting, and fun were happening at UAF. Now the more I deal with them and hear about their dealings through others employed there, I just get the stark feeling that they are part of the overarching over-mechanized problem in our community. In March I went to a sustainable agriculture conference here in town and the schism was real. UAF researches and CES people were suited and dressed to present grant-funded research on fruit trees that none of the rest of us--namely the growers selling crop shares at the Farmer's Market--could find applicability in. The reality is that real original and creative thinking just isn't finding its place at UAF these days. My rejection from their graduate creative writing program for the second time (after the first time I met with a department member who told me what I could do differently and I did THAT this time) is the personal testament to this. I spent January writing an original critical paper on Toni Morrison that went with my creative writing submission. It was good.

I've also been doing some vet teching out at North Pole as a temp. Last Wednesday I partnered with Tom from Calypso Farm to bring a sheep, goat kids, chicken, rabbits, and his sheepdog to Arctic Light Elementary to do a day-long ag-ed program. We had great fun. It furthered my dedication to that kind of educational programming and I'll be going back to working on my non-profit farm drafts soon. Of course, there we were with livestock on the playground and it was military firing practice day . . .
Gotta go, chick barn needs to be cleaned before the Saturday rush.

Everything Plays

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 18:40:00 +0000

There's a "famous" (if you work in those circles ;) children's book Everyone Poops but there should be another called "Everyone Plays". The more species I deal with the more I'm moved by the universal development of 'play' in the young, how parallel we are with puppies, lambs, hamsters, kittens, and now goslings and other poultry. We begin our lives solely focused on nutrition, warmth, ad rest, then our muscles start to exert themselves, start to stretch-stammer into clumsy movement, then we are suddenly intensely interested in toying with the skills that are the hallmark of the species we're a member of. In humans, it seems to be language, co-play, building/creating. In lambs it's flocking, running, nibbling, in kittens it's pouncing and biting. In geese it's water! I was moving between brooding boxes, having just left some week-old goslings with fresh shavings and water, when I heard massive commotion, the muffled thundering of web-feet all astir. I walked back over and the six goslings froze in place, water glistening on their yellow-brown down, dripping off their beaks, and spreading under their feet. I'm told that if they get much larger before being sold we give them swim breaks.

Computer skills I coulda/shoulda learned years ago . . .

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 14:51:00 +0000

How I wish I could fulfill my continuing education requirement for my vet tech license by going to this instead of the same lame (pun intended) "increase your dental revenue with preventative care" educational fare at our annual state meeting this fall. I have to do 10 CE credits before the end of the year, and I'm considering some online CE, but there still is virtually nothing on farm animal/ruminant health care. Even I am surprised at the dearth of resources. We do have U.S-based American Association of Ruminant Practitioners but I'll still have to do some petitioning to get any CE through them. And I don't think attending the 50th annual sheep-shear-a-thon will count with the Alaska State Board of Professional Licensing.

I'm subbing again today. Tomorrow Suze and I are giving two high school classroom talks--at different schools!-- that's after I take care of the chicks at the feed store and before I go work at North Pole Vet Clinic for the day. "Giblet", our impaired turkey chick, died the morning after we got him, but the guys replaced him with two other bantam chicks. I think they'll grow up to be barred rock chickens, the ones that look dressed in houndstooth cloth. Sexing them is still hard for me. I'm thinking we'll just wait and see who lays eggs. Meanwhile, they are hysterical with worms! They chase each other and fight if you don't give them each one!

I taught myself PowerPoint and am feeling very self-satisfied with that. Tania also schooled me up in html tags, and I'm still enjoying the power and the novelty of that as you can see. . .

Roundup in chick corral!

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 15:34:00 +0000

In the chick barn at the feed store there's a five-foot-long cattle watering trough in the center of the room set up to be a brooder to nearly 100 yellow-fuzzy Cornish crosses. To clean out the dirty shavings and the water-tower I get to take an enormous peice of corrugated cardboard and "herd" the whole peeping group of alarmed babies into one half of the brooder, then reverse it to clean the other side. A few tough-guy hold-outs get to experience the dreaded HAND -- my human arm lowering, chasing them around, then scoopong them up like a nerf-ball and pitching them back in with the group.

A half-dozen brooders of ducks and geese are set up, and of course the one brooder of bantam chickens. I'm still reading up on my chicken history, but bantams are essentially scaled-down versions of regular chickens. They come in most of he regular "flavors" and varieties (of which there are >130 !!). Why we humans developed miniature chickens may be related to why we created mini poodles . . .? If for no other reason I'd say it's because chicks the size of toothbrush heads are so damn cute you can't stand it. As you might guess, they aren't as popular for purchase as broilers or layers (don't get me wrong, you can broil a bantam, and a bantam hen will lay, Karl suggested humans developed bantams when they were more realistic about portion control!), so when the feed store orders a bath of bantams they usually come in packaged like a Whitman's Sampler, but without the flavor map. A few of every kind. Best guess wins.

Anarchy

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 17:34:00 +0000

I have time to write this today because, in responding to a request for a sub "teacher's aide" at Lathrop High School my job for the entire day is sitting in the discipline office with a single student taking the HSGQE -- that's the 'high school graduate qualifying exam' (insert eye roll here). Yesterday I was a custodian and, despite doing good work all day, the evening custodian 'ripped me a new one' when he came in and found me checking my e-mail in the custodial office instead of checking the roof drains. I went to the school office in tears, this guy following me, and admin "yelled" at him and the whole thing was a mess. All day I was begging for something to do, the lunch lady said "don't bother cleaning 'cause there's XYZ club in here after school' and I said I would just 'spot mop to keep busy' . . . you get the idea. Today the principal of Lathrop logged me onto the computer "'cause you'll need something to keep busy for 7 hours". AAAAAA!

Independent of this, (I was thinking about this yesterday even before being unfairly verbally attacked as someone 'stealing money by doing nothing') I think this ineffective socialized education system just needs to go. Let's look at this a different way. If you're hauling water up a hill to pour it into a big bucket and HALF the water is draining out of the bucket each time . . .what do you do? Do you keep doing the same thing and pouring into the same vessel? If we are "losing" half our kids -- if half are kids are being left behind in every way spiritually, academically, and functionally -- can't we begin to understand that there is something structurally wrong with public education? OK, so it's the "minorities" being left behind. . . let's pour money into "diversity" programs. No. "Minorities" ARE America. These are OUR children. Let's stop fooling ourselves. The future of a democratic America isn't white. We are continuing to try to function in a system brought over by Europeans that was formally developed in the sixteenth, seventeenth, eighteenth centuries when literacy and the sciences were the property of a moneyed and paternal religion. Every other culture in the world at that time was educating with peer-group oriented apprenticeships and tasks.
It is just so weird for me to stand in these public education rooms and begin every day "pledging allegiance"to a flag "under God" and "indivisible", then starting lessons standing next to globes and "save the earth" while being the person who collects hundreds and hundreds of pounds of plastic lunch trash because we don't cook or wash dishes in the schools. Lunch is sent up from Outside in plastic peel-and-eat packs, of which each child gets two.

On a lighter note, there's a free-to-good-home potty trained house-rabbit in the newspaper today. The catch? "To a snake-free home." Umm . . .

Questions at Woodriver Elementary

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 19:52:00 +0000

1. Do boys EVER learn to flush?!? Is this a form of creative expression that girls simply don't need? Do we teach them differently?

2. What is a "country steak finger" ??? Does it have anything to do with GMO food and artificial insemination?

apparently it does:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23921668/wid/11915773?GT1=31037

I'm using both blogs

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 16:35:00 +0000

check out the other one (link at right)

I'm busy

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 14:29:00 +0000

Essays are building up in my spirit, but it seems that just staying on top of my sub jobs, book groups, canning classes, enterprise development, meetings, liaisons and applications I'm always"ON" in that way needed for public interface. My two days at Denali Elementary as a reading-intensive tutor Monday and Tuesday were very busy. I had groups of students from first through sixth grade all day with 5 minute breaks and a short lunch. Wednesday afternoon I was very happy to take over for the Health Sciences teacher at Hutchison High. She has a great room there, and I still love Hutch. Even though I didn't get a permanent position in the teen parenting program they still call me and have me sub as a tutor and childcare provider. The kudos they give for my work make it worth it. It was "fake an injury day" at Hutch yesterday and today is "backwards day"-should be interesting.

I have SO much more to write, but I need to be there by 7:15 am --

Read this book

noreply@blogger.com (Cat Whitney) — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 20:36:00 +0000

order it here

http://store.tcpress.com/0807746657.shtml