Urbana

Endings and beginnings have been coming in quick succession lately.

The Summer BRIDGE institute at the U of I ended last week. I had the opportunity to work with 12 incoming first year students as a tutor for their composition class. It was a great experience, and hopefully I can cross paths with them as they progress through school. Many are first-gens and still on the path to developing academic literacy, but still they all have the ability to be successful at this game. Godspeed BRIDGE class of 2008!

I finished the independent study paper. It was a chore mentally, and I had to crank up the intrinsic pressure to get it done. While the writing is lacking, the research is there for days (hopefully!). And I look forward to continuing on this path of inquiry of the historical and current import of the Douglass Center as a space for self-determination within the black community here.

The move to Urbana is complete. We got by with a heap of help from starmaster and phyllis. Thank you so much!

There is still some cleaning to do and some boxes to unpack, but I must confess to a feeling of drastic yet positive separation from the old space. Just to put it out to the universe, I think this space will better our lives as a family here. And I'm moving from that "time on the rock" feeling back to the original orientation of engaging in process.

Now to get Noah's enrollment in place (my boy's starting kindergarten!), plan for the Odyssey course in the fall, and get my schedule straight for the term. As Dan Higgs says, "Which way to the work to d0?"

The Signified Anthem

Damn You Barack Obama

Darian Dauchan performs his Spoken Word Poem "Damn You Barack Obama, You Pretty Motha fu-ker" during the Urbana Team Slam Finals at the Bowery Poetry Club. May 2007

Here's to the power of rhetoric. Compare the use of repetition here by Dauchan with that of Rev. Wright's which has been in circulation of late. While their objects of "damnation" differ, each rhetor evokes possibility through the utterance. In each instance, the expression is used out of an evocation of love and toward an issuance of expectant hope and accountability on the part of the interlocutor. That's bad.

can it be?

Tracy gives me a bit of hope. How's that for black rhetoric?

inspiriation

Jake Shimabukuro

Welcome James!

You were born nine days ago. Gradually, the prospect of your arrival has shifted to the realization of your being here. Here's to the hope that anything done can be undone, or in the case of homo sapiens, that we are willing to put in the work to make this place more livable. Already in your lifetime, someone other than a white male is a serious candidate for president. Discussions related to the state of the natural environment are held in the popular media. You have a big brother.

Yet, there is still work to do. I'll do my best to do my part. Welcome!

baby bass

My friend Marcus recently scanned a bunch of photos from high school days. Thanks, Marc. I must be 17 or 18 in this pic, and at best had been playing bass for a year. Twenty years later, I'm still thumpin', though not as much as I'd like at the moment.