Some Notes on Ronnie James Dio

I just found out that Ronnie James Dio died of stomach cancer early this morning. Some of you may not know who that is, so I will tell you: He was a pioneering heavy metal singer. A very small man with a very huge voice. He dressed unabashedly dramatic, in capes and armor. He carried a sword in most of his videos. There were often dragons and pyrotechnics at his shows. He was the age of my father, and his heyday was a bit before my time, but if you know metal, you know that we respect our forefathers.

In addition to singing for Rainbow and Black Sabbath, he did his own thing, which was just called Dio. Their logo was a lovely calligraphy that all the metalheads learned to draw -- except this one. But I had friends. So my notebook too had "DIO" emblazoned across it in that perfect calligraphy all through junior high and high school.

His wife's report to the media said he died peacefully, and I'm glad for that. He was young for a normal person, but old for a rock star. I'm glad we had him for as long as we did and that he died in a dignified way, with his family beside him.

I'm not a huge Dio fan. I tend to favor deep, growling, harsh voices. Ronnie James Dio was an operatic-style singer. But I always appreciated his focus on the battle between good and evil. One of the reasons I began to love metal when I was 14 was that it addressed spiritual matters in a serious way. Dio is part of the reason it does that, and so he is part of the reason this music has been such a comfort and inspiration to me for such a long time.

And so this is the little thing I've written in order for my voice to be added to the many who pause to mourn and celebrate him. As a performer, he was grandiose, and fun, and a legend who never disappointed us, even in death.

Been a long time since I rock 'n'rolled...

Sorry I've been absent! In the land of mist and snow, there is little mist, there is no more snow...Except I heard there WAS some snow while I was down south in Brooklyn last weekend!

Here's a quick update, and I'll get back to regular blogging eventually:

1. We are finished teaching for the summer! I'm still going into work to grade, have meetings, etc., but at least I don't have to enact lesson plans or deal with "I didn't do my homework, so what am I supposed to do?" scenarios. (Answer: You are supposed to quietly make the best of the situation. You are an adult. Figure it out.) (But 90% of my students are scholarly angels.)

2. There is green everywhere in the village. The restaurants are open, the boats are out. Lawn furniture is coming out in yards, and the summer people are airing out their cabins and lake houses.

3. The people who lived here before us planted red and purple and violet-and-white tulips, so we have flowers.

4. They are putting in a new sewer line in front of my house, so every day these men come with machines that look like giant chainsaws that you can drive. So far, they are digging huge holes. I don't know what they'll do next. It's neat to watch.

5. My house is a disaster area. That's because I wrote another novel. When I do that, everything disintegrates around me. And I have an idea for another one. I think. So before that one gets started, I'm going to try to get this place at least hygenic.

6. Because I'm going home to Oklahoma soon. Really soon. Dreadfully soon. Northern New York is so beautiful and fun in the summer! But I'll be glad to see my family, my tribe, my musician friends...and I'll be glad to be really, really hot. They don't get really, really hot up here. It only gets into the 80s.

7. Okay...I have to actually go to work now. But we're nearly finished!

A Professional Blog, Mainly Directed At My Father

I talked to my father on the phone for two hours yesterday, yet we did not get around to the subject I am about to address here. So, to shave some time off the next call, I am going to put the foreward of what I want to talk about here. I'm putting it here instead of in an e-mail because someone else reading this may have an opinion also. But if not, that's okay. As is often the case, this blog is mainly for my father.

And here is the subject: Introduction to Non-Western Literature (the artist formerly known as "World Literature")

As I told you, I will be teaching this class in the fall. (For those of you reading this who don't know what I do for a living, I teach in the English department of a community college.) In the olden days, the course was World Literature, and it dealt with the old epics and things like that. Now, it is Non-Western Literature, and its purpose is to introduce students to the literature of non-western countries in order to give them insight into the relationships between people in our global community. A noble pursuit, and I will include it also. BUT one of the reasons I was so glad to get this class is that I've had a shocking amount of students, from the first day of class, ask if I would teach them Dante's Inferno. Only one of them wanted to read it because of the video game. The others had just heard about it, tried to read it, and found it too difficult without help. I tell you this to explain one of my reasons for designing the course to include some western literature and more of a focus on the old stuff than might be strictly appropriate.

Anyway, for all of you, here is the first part of my dilemma: I am choosing a textbook, and I very much want to teach out of the Norton Anthology of World Literature. I learned from the Norton anthologies, so their font and paper feels like "real" literature to me. They use good translators also. They are sometimes accused of being old-fashioned in their arrangements and choices, however. I can get around that, if I decide it's the case (but I won't decide it because I am so blinded by Norton love). What I can't get around is the fact that the Norton costs about $20 more than the other anthologies out there, and it's in two volumes.

I teach at a community college in a region that is suffering economically. Can I really ask my students to buy the more expensive textbook when the others have mostly the same works in them? The reason I want to have them buy the Norton is because those who are taking the class with me on purpose really want to know the epics. Some of them, in their individual Dante attempts, deliberately chose old translations to get a feeling of Literature with a capital "L," even thought that made it even harder for them to understand. I think they would love the Norton because it makes considered choices about balancing the beauty of language with accurate translation (I think)...but what of the people taking the class because they need another humanities credit and it's the only one that fits in their schedule? I'm not teaching English majors, for the most part, so they won't need to keep this book forever like we did. Still, I think it's worth it to have them read from the Norton. Do you? Or do you think I am letting my own nostalgia and bias interfere with this important decision?

And this question is REALLY for my father, but if you happen to have some insight, by all means, share it! So Daddy, you taught English at a high school with students the world expected little from, and often, they believed the world. The temptation would have been to bring in things "on their level," but instead you taught them Beowulf and The Canterbury Tales and Shakespeare. And to this day, they come up to you at the grocery store and speak of these works as if they are the most common knowledge. How did you DO that?!

I partly know, as I was raised by you. I know that 98% of your secret is not to speak of literature as something we learn but something that is in our lives. To recite bits of it in the context of real life, whether seriously or humorously. To make it something we have together, do together, are together, not something we study. To always make time for it (or was it me you were making time for?). To make reaching for its meaning both a social occasion (I'm thinking of when you read me The Black Cat when I was about 10 years old) and an individual pursuit (like when you sent me off at 13 to read The Wanderer because it was good, and then I was proud to have something to say about it later when you asked me).

But how does that translate to a college classroom? How did it translate to a high school classroom? (Although, come to think of it, your high school students had you before I did.) How do you give them literature as a heritage, not a skill set? Because I think my students want that very much. Some of them are coming back to school after years of being away in jobs or the Army, and they want to feel Educated (capital E) besides just knowing things. Some of them are young, and came to our college because they cannot afford to leave home, or fear leaving home. But they want their minds to leave home, even if their bodies cannot. And some choose to be here with us, and I must not disappoint them in that choice. And so they deserve a big experience. I can't give them the relationship with literature that you gave me because I am not their parent, but perhaps I can give them a bit of the relationship you gave your students.

So, think how you did that, and that's what I want to talk about this week. I'll call you. My schedule is frantic, and you, as you remind me constantly are a retired gentleman farmer, a man of leisure, the lord of the manor.

The Cruelest Month

It turns out that I love the deep, blood-curdling, all-encompassing cold. I knew I would. We are only a few weeks into spring, and already I miss the vast white fields and frozen lake. I miss my snowboots, my snow overalls, and the long-handled broom I used to push snow off my windshield every morning.

It's the half-cold I can't stand. We've had sunny days and some gray rainy ones. The gray rainy ones aren't so bad, but the sunny cold ones make me crazy. They remind me of winter in Mississippi. There, the sky was always so extradordinarily blue and lovely -- but in the winter, a cold that felt like it came outward from my core appeared. But it wasn't even the cold itself; it was the fact that there was cold at all in this place that was usually so extremely hot. The cold didn't suit Mississippi. It never felt natural. It was like the weather was wearing someone else's ill-fitting clothes, and I was relieved when it threw them off and put on the heat again.

But at least it's not like Oklahoma spring. There, we have to worry about tornadoes. The snakes and ticks wake up. The wind blows. At least it gets beautiful, though. Out in the woods, you find bouquets of Easter lilies and wildflowers. The little trees have buds on their tips, then flowers, then bees and butterflies.

In Italy, spring seemed to come overnight. I went to sleep in winter and woke up to flowerboxes and fields of poppies and women in bright sundresses and silver sandals. The farms and the mountains were almost unbearably picturesque. We'd walk along the canal at Marola wearing sweaters and I wouldn't believe I was awake, living in Italy, in love in the spring. Because spring was when Joe would deploy then. So the in-between springs, when he didn't, were magical.

Anyway, spring here is muddy and cold. We've had a few actually warm days -- in the 70s and 80s -- and those gave me a terrible longing for summer, when, perhaps, it will really be warm. In the meantime, the breeze off the lake is cold, and the sun is a trick. I can't figure out the right configuration of layers to wear, and the dogs' paws are muddy all the time. And when it rains, there are worms all over the sidewalks. I just walk staring straight ahead to get from one place to the next. When the sun comes back out, they dry up in hieroglyphics. It seems unfair. And that is spring.

Dirt

Back in November, when my husband was still home and we were on Thanksgiving break, all our neighbors made piles of leaves and sticks. They raked them to the curb and the village trucks came around and picked them up. We raked some of our leaves -- the ones in the front yard, mainly. But we were on break, so we left some of the leaves in the backyard. Okay, truthfully, most of the leaves in the backyard.

Then The Airborne (as my father calls him) went to Afghanistan. It snowed. The snow never melted. Until now.

Last week, the neighbors all raked up their remaining leaves, the new sticks, and whatever else was in their yards. They made piles of sticks. I was scrambling to keep up with my work and told myself I was too tired and it was too cold to do my own yard. I kept putting it off. But now I am on spring break. I fear I may have missed the village trucks, but I'm not sure. I saw a few people still raking when I walked the dogs this afternoon.

It's about 73 degrees. I forgot what it feels like to sweat in the sun. I forgot that piles of leaves are wet on their undersides and that when you rake them, the smell of cool, moist dirt wafts up at you. Under the leaves, little white-green shoots are coming up out of the soil, which is the color of wet coffeegrounds.

I can't believe we left so many leaves. I've been raking them and pulling up these dead stalks that The Airborne hates. For two hours I have been doing this, and my yard now has piles of things but doesn't look that much better. At least it smells of spring out there now. I have no idea what to do with the piles if the village doesn't come to get them. I don't live in the country, so I can't just burn them.

All I can think about is how I'm so glad I'm not in Oklahoma because a yard like mine would be crawling with copperheads.

I know I ought to go back out there and work some more, but I'm feeling a little defeated. I'm working on the terrible script and the metal novel that is the love of my life but not going so well. I want to write them. I miss living in the country, where Outside takes care of itself.

The dogs were tied to the deck. They rolled over and slept in the shade and are now covered with tiny pieces of leaves. My hands have the beginnings of blisters. My piece of New York is out from under winter and trying to breathe.

Attention!

Some of you may remember that I participated in National Novel Writing Month last November. The resulting 50,546-word novel was a joy to create (except when it was agonizing). So I've decided (as of about 11:30 p.m. on March 31) to participate in Script Frenzy this year.

It's the same concept, but with a script: To "win," you have to write 100 pages of a script during the month of April. I came up with a bad, bad idea and began right at midnight. That's why I am up at 2 a.m. as I write this.

So...I thought you might like to know. Four pages down...96 to go!

South

I love New York. I always wanted to live here, and here I am. It is never disappointing. Every day, I remember that I am lucky. Every day, it is my job to check on Black River Bay, and this is a good job.

And so I do not say what I'm about to say in order to convey any kind of sadness, because I am not sad.

For the last three weeks, I have dreamed over and over about the coast of Mississippi. I used to live down there...not quite on the coast, but just up from it. We were stationed in Italy, and the Iraq part of the war had just started. When my husband went to the war, I went to south Mississippi. I was getting my doctorate down there and had to go to class. Then, after a year, he came home, and I went back to Italy to stay with him. But the next year, he went to Afghanistan, and I went back to Mississippi. And so on, until I finished my doctorate and we moved way up here, to New York.

The first part of the war was incredibly awful. Communication was difficult and slow, and people kept getting hurt and killed. And graduate school, for those of you who haven't been, has some difficult parts even though it's fun. So it was a hard time all around. But I lived in south Mississippi, and there were no sharp edges there for me.

My apartment was on the second floor of a two-story building. Long into the hot nights, me and my neighbors -- college students and National Guard people stationed at Camp Shelby -- would sit out on the balcony drinking tea, passing around the resident baby, petting the stray cats our landlady encouraged us to spoil. In the day time even, on the weekends, I'd sit out there boiling, reading inscrutable literary theory and making notes for my papers. And sometimes, when the war was too terrible or the sky was that deep blue it only gets in Mississippi, I'd leave everything I ought to be doing and drive 45 minutes to sit by the ocean.

Sometimes I'd drive straight from work. I'd be down there in the dirty sand wearing my dress shoes, sharing donut holes with the gulls. This was before Hurricane Katrina, so if I looked one direction, there were lovely huge houses and if I looked the other direction, there was the bay. To a girl from Oklahoma, smelling the ocean is miraculous. My Mississippi friends teased me for loving it. They didn't consider their beach a beach or the bay the ocean, but it was salt water, there were jellyfish, and I couldn't see its end, so to me, it was the ocean. It was everything I needed right then.

Every time I drove toward it, I'd feel like I was going to find out it wasn't really there. That's how much I loved it. And unfortunately, one day, much of it really wasn't there anymore, after the hurricane. It was a long time before we could drive down there, and even then, driving down there wasn't the right thing to do unless you came to help. So I came to help sometimes, but not enough. And I never helped the Mississippi coast as much as it helped me.

I hate that every time I talk about it now I have to talk about the hurricane.

I haven't been dreaming about the hurricane. When I dream of the coast right now, it's like it was before -- a little dirty, a little tacky in places, a quiet place where I could sit on the sand and watch banana boats. There used to be a restaurant with a lobster on its roof and a casino shaped like a pirate ship. The Mississippi coast wasn't an idyllic place, even before the hurricane, but there are a lot of beautiful things missing from it now.

Still, I love it, and I wish I could go there. I think I dream of it because it still sometimes seems weird that my husband is deployed and I'm not in Misssissippi. I never considered being anywhere else. I keep dreaming I park my car by the pier in Gulfport and start walking along the beach, then forget to stop and realize I've walked all the way to Alabama and it's getting dark. Last night in my dream, there was a party going on all along the water's edge, so it wasn't scary walking back. Everyone was making big vats of shrimp and dancing.

I'm so happy in New York, and this deployment is no worse than any other so far. Like I said, I'm not sad. But there is a longing that is not sadness, and that's what I have: Wishing so deeply that if I just blink my eyes real hard I'll find I dreamed myself in New York but I'm really lying across my bed in Mississippi with the window open and the humid heat all through me and my car full of gas so I can just get in and drive through the longleaf pines until I can't go any farther south.