By far, the most difficult part about letting you come up with questions for me to answer is the sheer number of them. Too many great ones will be left off this post since I said I would only choose 10 to go into the contest drawing for a mystery box full of goodies. But here’s the good news (for me): since I’m back to work these days and posting become sparse this time of year I’ll try to post more often by using the rest of the questions. Lazy Bloggers Unite!

Mir asked a beautifully worded question:

Question 1: A man has invited you to his place for dinner. No, don’t bring anything, he tells you—he’s cooking everything. The whole meal is from scratch, from appetizer to dessert.

Now: What did he feed you that renders you putty in his hands?

Answer: First of all, this is a good question because of the fantasy nature of it. Secondly, he feeds me savory foods with a spicy flair. Something that makes me roll my eyes back in my head because it’s so tasty. For starters, he makes a guacamole that has thick chunks of avocado and plenty of cilantro. This is followed by a blackened chicken atop a cajun alfredo sauce with noodles, a salad with a homemade dressing, and he finishes it off with something dripping with chocolate ganache. Possibly tiny vanilla cupcakes that he can feed me. Literally.

Karen P asked:

Question 2: My daughter taught German in a middle school in Milwaukee. The district had a rule that a child could not receive a zero. They could refuse to do any work and would still not receive a zero. 60% was the lowest grade that could be given. What do you think of that kind of policy?

Answer: I would really like to know their rationale for coming up with this and why they felt it necessary to accept way below the mediocrity line. If I show up to work and do nothing I sincerely doubt my employer would be willing to give me ANY MONEY, much less 60% of my salary. This isn’t reflective of anything I can think of in real life so teaching children this way is disturbing. If students can sit in a classroom all year long and receive partial credit for doing nothing, then our future is dim. Make it interesting enough of a lesson that children want to do it. Someone once said, “Learning can only happen when a child is interested. If he’s not interested it’s like throwing marshmallows at his head and calling it eating.” Let’s not call zero work learning and assign it a grade. Let’s back up and figure out how better to engage students in the learning process.

Trisha’s question made me dissect parts of me that have long been dormant, but this one was a very good exercise. She said this:

Question 3: I’m a Harry Potter NUT. In the book, there’s this mirror that shows you having everything you’ve ever wanted. Harry, of course, saw himself standing next to his parents. If you were to look in the mirror, what would you see? You surrounded by family? You holding a martini while wearing your zombie shoes? I wanna know!

Answer: It was probably because she added that I wanna know exclamation point that made me furiously try to come up with an answer. When I think back to what Harry desired it was something that he didn’t have and wanted to experience. Following that logic, I would have to want something I’ve never experienced but wanted. That would be a chance to travel the world. All these places elude me, interest me, and excite me so desiring a long stay in a place like Belize or Fiji or Greece is where I would see myself in the Mirror of Erised. I might be carrying a pocketful of real gold Galleons and drinking a butterbeer, but I’d be doing it while wearing a sarong and exploring exotic lands with my loved ones.

Yolanda from Callipygian Chronicle asked this seemingly simple yet extremely complex question:

Question 4: Are you holding on or letting go?

Answer: Last week when Yolanda asked that question I wondered about which part of my life to which she was referring. I can only estimate that she meant it in terms of not only marriage and love and relationships and personal goals but everything. For the better part of five years I have come to understand that since all growth is forward and my life will get away from me if I let it, I have been letting go of things. There have been toxic relationships that I have purposefully severed because when people don’t expect the best from me as much I expect it, I have to let go. When I’m unable to reconcile personal beliefs and ideologies, I have to let go and take whatever consequences come with it. When my own doctrine of grabbing life by the junk is diametrically opposed to the person I struggle to be, I let go and take the necessary steps to exist in a compatible harmony with my own self. The greatest lesson I’ve learned over the last few years is that I can’t make adults behave. Their free will supersedes my need for them to behave better and not be stupid, selfish jerks. Most of the time I am the stupid, selfish jerk anyway. I am most assuredly letting go.

Lu from Art-Slam asked me one of those questions that is answered differently depending on the season of your life. She asked:

Question 5: Do you believe in true love?

Answer: In this season of my life I have choices that can make or break my daily life. I believe we get to choose who we love. Haven’t I done that with my friends? Of course I have. Some of them are easy to love and some a little more difficult, but the warts and all philosophy has to fit in there somewhere. Love is true when you both want it and accept it for what it is. In accordance with my own reality, I believe in true love and search for it on a regular basis. Otherwise, I am but a resounding warning bell gonging incessantly reminding myself that this isn’t it! and then I keep on searching. True love isn’t always dreamy and pretty and the more I am accepting of my own warts the easier it becomes to accept another person’s imperfections. True love can be shrouded in pink, sparkly bows with dancing unicorns but unless I try to practice it unconditionally, I’ll never find it.

Irma’s question made me dig back into the recesses of my brain and come up with … well … recess. My thoughts turned immediately to my junior high years.

Question 6: If you had the chance to go back in time and choose a different career, which would you have picked?

Answer: In junior high we were constantly asked what we wanted to do in life. Being a teacher never jumped out at me so whenever I answered one of those surveys it came back that I should be a nurse (why not a world class surgeon? I wonder). Caring for people and wanting the best for them come in handy as a trait as an educator, too, so I guess I answered honestly. But if I were to have my dream career it would really be to have been a dancer. Why else do I cry every year at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade when the Rockettes perform? It’s because I REALLY WANTED TO MAKE MONEY DOING A KICK LINE ON STAGE. I hope you don’t think I’m joking, either. My dreams back then were to dance and I haven’t lost my appreciation (or greenish jealousy) for that craft.

Grace was the first respondent and no matter how long this thing has gone on I can’t keep from coming back to it:

Question 7: Do you wear your hooker shoes during the day?

Answer: Hooker shoes are to be worn when I am vaccuuming the house or going out for a respectable cup of coffee with a friend. This is a must. But never ever out at night when they are too predictable. (Side note: I told my friend Susan from Friday Playdate last week that I will occasionally put on my last prom dress and prance around the house. Again. Nothing I would actually wear out of the house, but the fantasy of being a flapper girl dancer is strong in me. Oh, yeah. My last prom dress in high school was a white flapper dress. Best fantasy of all? IT STILL FITS.)

Deb Roby posed this question which was, without a doubt, the easiest question of all for me to answer:

Question 8: Martinis: dirty or not?

Answer: Dirty, dirty, dirty. In fact, when I’m ordering a dirty martini (extra cold, vodka, no gin and plenty of blue cheese filled olives, thank you very much) I usually say, “Just how dirty can you make a martini? Like, really super nasty dirty? Because that’s the dirty martini for me. Really. Tell the bartender to make it a super stanky dirty martini.”

JoPo, whose email address made me wonder just how people find me (are you a medical student? intern? professor?), asked me this question:

Question 9: Why do you remember your favorite teacher?

Answer: I can actually name my favorite teacher in high school and it’s Mrs. Reisig. I was in her sophomore English class and when we read The Crucible I recall that she always valued my opinion and when I offered it she was respectful and caring. Her own passion for what she was doing made me want to teach like that later in life when I became a high school English teacher. If I was excited about it, wouldn’t students also be excited? I also remember that she welcomed students in her home (with her husband, Mr. Reisig, a fellow English teacher in the same school) and always looked me in the eye when she was talking to me. She knew, as did everyone else at school, that I already had a baby by the time I got to her class and she never once brought it up or let me use it as an excuse not to get my homework done. The reason she is memorable is because he held high expectations for me when others didn’t. Due to her urging me to run for class officer I won the seat as a senior and was the vice-president of Student Government. The adult sponsor was Mr. Reisig.

RD is, I think, a new reader. I usually remember all the names and emails of commenters and this one seemed unfamiliar to me. She asked this next one.

Question 10: How exactly do you begin to write a book about your life and experiences (and believe that anyone would be interested in it)? I guess this is both a technical question and a courage question – I would love to do this someday myself, but don’t even have a blog!

Answer: Notice that I saved this one for last? I suppose, RD, that there is a great amount of ego and self confidence that goes into this one. I think I have good stories from my life and I think I tell good honest stories. (So much better in person, because I can act them out and really get into it!) It isn’t that I’ve had far different experiences or rare ones that no one else has had, either. It comes down to how I’ve responded to them and how I try to critically look at them from a standpoint of someone who learns and matures through the adventures. This is why I even started a blog 6 years ago. Do you need a blog to begin writing a book? No way. But the practice of the writing craft gets to flex its muscles and you get constant feedback on your writing. What I’ve learned, then, is that the telling of them through blogging and personal journaling forces me as a writer to get to the heart of the story and what it is I want to impart to readers. Some days I think, that was a total bust! and others I may write something seemingly benign to me (because, perhaps, I have told the story in person so many times that the initial interest factor is now lost on me) and get a lot of wow! you should write a book on stuff like this. Either way, you have to write write write. Many things I write will never see the light of day under the nose of a book editor, but it’s for me and I have to be okay with that.

Now let’s get down to brass tacks. The winner, based on the random generator is: number 5! Congratulations Lu from Art-Slam! You need to contact me with your shipping address and I will have the goods delivered to you soon. Soonish. REALLY SOONISH. In the meantime, which of the above questions would you be able to answer in the comment section? I think it’d be fun to see which one you come up with and give some feedback. Really, it’s free. Won’t cost you a thing. You can practice your writing and reflect on some excellent questions posed by some amazing people.

This week I am up to my eyeballs in stuff. Stuff like taking the kids swimming, going to the water park, playing more tennis than I’ve ever played in my life, getting tennis elbow, riding bikes, baking pies, getting in my 2 hours of writing each day, and generally getting ready to return to work. Tomorrow.

I said TOMORROW.

So I stopped at my new office today (new office! new school! new windows to see the sunlight!) and met one of the janitors there who quickly became my BFF. We all know that’s the way it works. If I ever expect to get my trash emptied and have him haul my boxes up to my new office, then I’d better find a way to make that man happy.

I meant with something like a nice lemon icebox pie. What were you thinking?

These last few hours of vacation are spent on important things like children, eating good food, going to the movies with a gaggle of friends tonight, and writing about shoes for BlogHer. And while I’m wrapping up my book and polishing off the necessary paperwork to go out and be rejected accepted by a publishing house, I was catching up on my Time magazine reading. They have a section where they ask people 10 questions that are supposed to be revealing in some way. What would you ask someone like Shirley Sherrod? I thought. Or that Old Spice guy, Isaiah Mustafa?

These are the zombie shoes I mention in that post. You should really go and read it now. Or maybe just order them online.

Then I came up with a contest. I like to get a sponsor for my blog contests sometimes, but others? Well, I like to do it my damn self. And I want to give away some of the books I’ve read to get my shelves ready for my own published book. SOMEDAY, right? A gal can hope.

So, ask your questions. I will try to answer them as honestly as possible and still keep some semblance of privacy. Ten will be chosen, but one of the ten chosen will win a box of books. From me to you. *Plus, a little surprise or two because I like to do that kind of stuff. It must be the Southern Hospitality my father instilled in me even though my Northern Hospitality mother is more likely to do this kind of thing.

Comments will close on Friday, July 30 when I look up from my desk at my new job and say, “Really? Only 17 people asked questions? Ok. Fine. I’ll still choose a winner.” and then I’ll answer the Ten Best Questions for a post on the following Monday.

This should be fun unless the fun is all in my head in which case I will just go an infuse some more vodka which is now a part of the summer fun in which I’ve been indulging AND OK I’LL STOP NOW JUST ASK SOME GOOD QUESTIONS.

*It is entirely possible that I might add goodies in this Book Box that have helped me have a good summer. Sunblock, tennis balls, infused vodka. (KIDDING. I don’t think that’s allowed. Is it?) I dunno. I’m feeling weird.

It’s been a while since I’ve given an update on the Purse Drive that I started a few months back. If you’re so totally over the fact that I came up with the Purse Drive let me just say this: there is a big ol’ contest I’m doing to win a $500 Visa gift card at the end of this post. So, either you can take heart and walk along this really cool journey with me or you can be selfish go straight to the end of this post to win something.

It’s up to you.

Just remember this teeny tiny word: KARMA.

Initially, the idea behind the purse drive came after one of my female students cried to me about not having the correct size purse to carry at school. Anything larger than a piece of 8×10 paper wasn’t allowed in the classroom as a safety concern. So, I started cleaning out my own closets looking for something and then started asking friends if they had anything they wanted to get rid of in the way of purses since I know how many purses my friends own. A LOT. YOU LADIES OWN A LOT OF PURSES. After that, I started asking around to my online friends not knowing whether or not they’d find it a worthwhile cause.

The overwhelming response made me think a lot about how grassroots efforts take off at rocket speed.

Then, I thought it would be difficult to figure out how to get the purses into the girls’ hands without starting a riot since I had some Coach purses and a few Betsey Johnson bags and other designer clutches. It occurred to me that charging a mere $5 per purse would work. There was a lot of criticism for that because they were donated in the first place so that only lasted a few days until the girls at my school realized they could come to me for a new, size-accepted purse. Now, the purses reside in a few places in my building where girls can go for a purse. More often than not they shyly enter my office, ask if I’ve still got some purses left, and if they are able to take a look at them. It’s encouraging to watch the process because they sort of act like they’re picking out a new puppy, not something to hold wallets and cell phones and tampons.

Some moments cannot be captured in print from this experience and I honestly don’t want to exploit every girl who has visited me for a purse. As long as this has been going on, however, I’m still surprised by the girls who ask, “Would you be able to help me with a purse, please?” and not because they say “please” but because they still need them and have, without any formal prompting, found their way to see me for a purse.

Enough sappy stuff, let’s get on with the giving away of even more stuff! If you click on that link you’ll be taken to my Review Blog to read about my experience driving a Lincoln MKT crossover vehicle for a week and then you can enter the contest to win a $500 Visa gift card. Good luck!

While she is here for her birthday, Maddie was asked to pick the winner of the laptop from Acer and she came up with Mamacita’s number! Congratulations, Mamacita! Contact me with your address information at the e-mail over there on the left sidebar to get your prize. Thanks to everyone who entered! It was fun to read about all the back to school rituals people have.

In other Back-To-School news, BlogHer has published a letter I wrote from an educator’s point of view to parents of my students.

Finally, I used a Neti Pot. That’s not really interesting news, but it was a moment I’ll not soon forget. Unfortunately, it came amidst the birthday festivities last night and I’m hoping all the kids will instead remember Red Velvet cupcakes and the Mel Brooks film festival we had last night.

It seems very strange for me to begin this post with, “Man! Y’all do some really stupid stuff!” but it’s true. I’m sorry. You do. But it’s ok! I do, too! All the time. I’m probably doing something stupid right now and won’t figure it out until next Thursday. This time, however, I asked you to share because I had a book and a surprise to giveaway. The comments made it difficult to choose but in the end I have come up with a winner.

I chose Heather from Unproductive Reproduction (or maybe it’s actually called Production Not Reproduction and you see? right there? Me=stupid.) because it was such a silly thing she did to set out for one destination and end up at another. Thus, not actually picking up her children. (Heather’s brand of “stupid” is something I would do. Maybe I have. I’m too stupid to remember.)

Send me an email, Heather! I promise to drive to the post office to mail this and possibly end up at the dry cleaners to pick up clothing I dropped off sometime last Fall. And then, I’ll turn around and actually get to the post office. Ok. So email me. I’ll get your book and surprise in the mail and won’t tell readers what it is until you get it.

Let’s move on to something cool because all this stupid going around the solar system of my brain is going to make me chicken out of sending in my application to Mensa.

Maddie came to visit us this entire past week for her Spring Break and it was pretty darn awesome. Even cooler, she set out to get a tattoo. In my handwriting.

Haven’t I told you this stuff before?

Anyway, she loves the poem by e e cummings entitled “i carry your heart”. One of the few letters she ever received during the open adoption we had gave her the idea for this. For years she had only seen my handwriting and never a picture of me. This, coupled with the fact that Mallory has a tattoo with my handwriting coupled with the fact that she does, indeed, carry my heart led her to this:

And now? I’ve written on my daughters and they will have it forever. The ink may fade, but my heart? All my children take that with them everywhere they go.