Who said private education is better?

So I just heard a conversation in the hall that went somewhat along these lines:

Where did you go for Thanksgiving?
I just went home.
Where's home?
Washington DC.
Wow, that's a long drive!
Not that bad, it's only 8 hours.
Nuh uh!
Yeah.
You mean Washington, like where the president lives?
Yeah.
That's on the complete other side of the country.
It's not that far from here.
But it takes forever to get to Oregon.
DC is on the east coast.
You're talking about Washington where the president lives?
Yeah, it's between Maryland and Virginia.
Washington?
Yeah, not Washington State, DC!
I don't understand. Where's Washington DC?

At this point I couldn't help but step out into the hallway and ask incredulously, "are you serious?" Which she was. Completely. So I found a map on the internet, and she said, "wow, I guess you really do learn new stuff at school!" New!? That is new to her?! That the President of the United States lives in Washington DC, on the east coast, not Washington State! That's the private education system at work for you. Think of that before you sign your children up for Christian education.
As the students were leaving the office the one turns to the other and says, "let's keep this our little secret". Secret, yeah right!

Thanksgiving with the family. Need I say more? I barely had my coat off before my grandmother started with the "when are you getting married" tirade, "I want to go to a wedding before I die". See, my grandmother is 88 and convinced she won't see another Thanksgiving. Granted she had been convinced of this for the past 5 years, but she has decided that this is it, and I need to get married. Only me. She didn't start on my cousins, who, by the way, are all older than me. She almost started on my brother, but only half-heartedly. No, I am the grandchild that needs to get married. This year. To a complete stranger if that's what it takes. She offered to set me up with her mailman, and a very nice cab driver who told her he wanted to meet a nice redheaded woman. Thank goodness she lives in KY, or I might find strange men at my doorstep. So I need to find myself a nice boy (it used to be a nice Jewish boy, but she is so desperate for me to get married she doesn't care about the Jewish part anymore) and get married within the next 6 months or so. No problem.
Other than that, Thanksgiving was great. My brother drove home from WY, so it made for a very special holiday. We haven't seen him in 2 years. The family is even planning a trip to visit him next June. It will be interesting to see how many of them follow through.
It's late. Must sleep.

I don't know if I can put into words what I'm thinking or feeling right now. Have you ever had the experience of being in a moment and suddenly realizing who you are? Actually, not realizing, remembering. I was that person once, but I've strayed so far from that path I had forgotten how much I liked her, and how much I miss her. How can I get that person back? I have to reevaluate my life and make some decisions about where to go from here. I would have to go back to the beginning and start over if I am to become that person again. I don't know if I have the guts. It's so much easier to be the responsible adult and sacrifice myself to the grind than to try to do what I know I have always wanted to do.
I'm about the same age now that my dad was when he had to make the same decision. The difference is, I don't have a family to take care of. Not that it bothered him much, he left anyway. Spent 10 years traveling the country with just his motorcycle and his guitar, playing covers in any dive that would give him a cut. It amazes me sometimes how much I am like a man I never really knew, but I am him. My family says I'm a clone of my mom, and if you see the two of us together it is a little frightening how much we look alike, but I've always acted more like my dad. My brother got the talent and I got the desire to make a living out of it. It hardly seems fair, but that is life, as they say.
When I started college as a music major, my mother was horrified. When she learned all that went into the music engineering degree, she was a little relieved by the calculus and physics requirements. She thought that I would have some hope of finding a job when the music thing bottomed out on me. Supportive, huh? But she sent me a card later in the year with some joke about marrying a rock star, and under it she wrote "don't just marry a rock star, be one". Sometimes I think I should've taken that advice. Of course, how many people go to college to be rock stars? It's been so long since I've taken that idea seriously. I can't play anymore. I haven't written a song in years. How can I start over now? But tonite, sitting around my apartment, listening to one of my students playing my guitar and singing along, I realized, this is who I am. I will never be happy pretending to be a librarian, or whatever other profession I try to throw myself into. Music is the only thing that gets to me. I don't have a passion for helping people find books or research articles. But turn on the radio and I'm completely lost to the world. Nothing else exists except that song.
As Oprah says, find your passion and live it. Maybe this time I will take the advice.

It's the cities, stupid

Yes, more politics, but this is interesting. I don't agree with everything in the article. Being from the heartland and a person of faith (that sounds so weird when applied to me), I don't see those things as being mutually exclusive to being educated, reasonable, realistic and liberal. He has a good point, however. I've always known that living in an urban setting was better than then country, but I never stopped to think about the political advantages. And I must say, I'm very happy to see that Jackson WY voted for Kerry. Jackson, for those of you who don't know, is the home of our "glowering" VP (and my brother) and one of the most beautiful places in the US.

Wow, that didn't take long

It seems we're already losing ground. This is a secular society? Whatever.