Post-Toasty

Post-Toasty by Batricia Steward (Me)
The sun was up but darkness weighed upon my spirit. I glanced at it. Blindness covered the darkness with one bright circle as my eyelids closed and retinas burned. My eyes opened while I did nothing. They looked away from it, but its empty, blank silhouette still covered everything, the large, white spot, refusing to disappear from influencing how one might view her surroundings. Then the old world reappeared—the one that prided herself because of her status with Man, the one that shared the same sun with Mars but thought narrowly of her relationship with him. To me, this world was not so different than the old old world that thought she was herself flat while those who dared to challenge her claims of herself would fall from her edges, not so unlike one man’s tale of an angel that had fallen from grace.
At one particular part of the Pacific Crest Trail, not that identifying it is really important, there’s a view I've discovered several times, though it has never really been the same view between visits. Sometimes I see something new added to the landscape or something else vanished, and sometimes what has always been there is simply there in a way that it had never been there before, altered, modified, changed—the clouds, for example. But I don’t find the shapes of animals or objects in clouds, at least not to the best of my recollection. I appreciate that they are themselves, always changing form, from thick to thin, to bunched up in one portion of the sky to scattered about from east to west or north to south and moving at various paces and directions with the breeze. On a good day, every one of my senses is consumed by this world—with the crisp, fresh smell of a smogless air and the unusually rhythmic sound of the various local birds, some chirping, others cackling, and still others even singing. On this day, however, there was no smell and no sound, and no breeze touched me; rather, the empty, blank silhouette disrupted my view.
I could see things that were not directly ahead. I used the perimeter of my sight to guide my steps to get there and to see what there was to be seen. At first it was quite an annoyance not being able to see the center of focus, but as I learned to focus on everything else, I grew much more, not exactly satisfied but perhaps, content with my new ability to see what I would not normally have seen. My other senses returned. The white, empty, blank spot became black, not literally this time, but I put it out of my mind and focus. In fact, the perimeter of my sight which could have remained active, if I so chose to allow it to be, also became the empty blank circle, shortly; and then it too turned to coal. I was left with nothing on which to focus in front of me, not even on my surroundings did I focus. Instead, I found another place, a view that had never before existed for me.
I found myself on a street with big businesses dominated by women. Women of color. Women of women. Women without money. Women without color, who insisted that they were not to be associated with men without color. My retinas burned again.
Another black emptiness appeared. It went black. Again a white circle encompassed it. And then it, the outer circle, all that was left, also turned to coal and blackness.
I found myself at a computer in a cyborg chat room, where no one had control over their names. All identifying usernames were randomly selected by an untouchable control system. All users had agreed to the cyborg code—that no identifying information could be stated. That is—not only could we not identify ourselves by name, but neither could we identify our age, sex/gender, religion, political affiliation, country of origin or citizenship, socioeconomic class, and so forth. But what a user did no explicitly type was arguably woven implicitly into conversations with queer diction, sentence structure, jargon, and so forth. Their identities were clear enough to anyone who bothered to guess. One cyborg who I chatted with, nearly broke the code. She felt she could identify me because of my empathetic tone among other things implied in my chatting with her. I expressed the same feelings as she and took to her as a sister when we discussed our Xs. She nailed me, or so she thought, as a new feminist, not because I am one but, because she sensed I understood her. She didn't actually call me one but asked if I was one. I felt violated, as if being asked if I was a “feminist” was a derogatory accusation. I can only guess that she would have liked to have said that she too was a feminist, but because that would have been a clear cyborg code violation, she could not. In truth I don’t really know if she was really a she. My retinas burned again.
I found myself on asphalt in the middle of a desert.

"transcending perceived distinctions..."

As Geoffrey Sirc discusses "transcending perceived distinctions of age, gender, rave, and ethnicity, and emphasizing rich verbal and visual style," I first thought about the literature test for the comprehensive exam (138). In particular, I first wondered how visual rhetoric could blur the distinctions. Next I thought that Sirc might mean something completely different than that. he might mean that there are clear distinctions that should not be overcome. I don't know...

"You'll never find it now."

So tonight, my littlest one, Kayla, a two year old, grabbed my cell phone, and I said, go ahead and play with it, thinking it would be no big deal. The next thing I know--she is making it vibrate as if I am receiving a voice mail. So I tell her, "Let me have it, Kayla." So she throws my cell phone and says, "You'll never find it now."

"Kendall!"

So I was camping last year with my wife, three children, and our neighbors/friends. Anyway, we were all inside a net/tent (whatever those are called) spending time in camping lounge chairs, in the sun but out separated from the flying bugs. One of my little ones, who was three then, was smacking the net with her hand. There was the potential of making a preexisting hole bigger than it was, so I threatened her: "Kendall," I said, "if you keep it up, I'm gonna spank you so hard you won't remember your name." So the next thing we knew, she hit the screen again. I got out of my lounge chair, went out of the screen, spanked Kendall, and immediately I heard her shout, "Kendall!"

I don't spank them anymore: it obviously does not work.

Virtual Classroom

Re: the virtual classroom, which we received a link in an email from Dr R—
Briefly, it is a program that allows a teacher or teacher-to-be to try out strategies on virtual kids. The advantage is that the teacher can’t hurt the real classroom climate or hurt a real student’s feelings and so forth. I love it. I wish the state had infinite funds so our districts could eventually get a hold of this program. I’d love to try it.

Here’s the site:
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/education/orl-virtualkid1508may15,0,1998552.story

text rating for Writing New Media

The more I read and notice the format and images in the Writing New Media text, the more I dislike it.

I hate to sound as if I know what the authors and editors should be including in their text. I definitely don’t know. But this text seems so primitive; it seems so in a state of experimentation, which is good, but also it is as if the authors or editors just want to piss me off with an obscure design.

But it makes me think of what it is like to look back at some very old texts that have such primitive visuals. Can I try to compare them to ancient scrolls? Can I look at ancient scrolls and compare them with texts with similar purposes of today? Can I imagine that I go into future and compare this text to a future text about writing media? Will this appear to be a relic? I don’t know; I could stand looking at ancient scrolls. This I can’t!

I will continue my idiot wind—having to turn my head to read the page numbers is just stupid. No you can’t get me to explain myself any more than you can get the editors (is that who is in charge of formatting?) to have a bit of reason for facing page numbers so inconveniently in two different directions, neither of which is the direction of the letters on its page. I’m surprised the headings and subtitles aren’t upside-down. Is technology supposed to make things more difficult? Am I missing the point? Is it supposed to be ironic? Oxymoronic? Or just moronic?

Perhaps the problem is mine. Is it me who comes from such a life of luxury that I wish my literature to have reason with its formatting? Is such a formatting issue really a puzzle, which I must interpret? I generally don’t mind interpreting puzzles of sorts, but my interpretation is that I’m supposed to notice that it looks weird. I must be missing something. Perhaps it is like those pictures, whatever they are called, that you must stand at a distance and look through them to get a view of something hidden. That must be it. Excuse me. I must go back to turning the text sideways to see if there are any hidden holograms behind it.

My visual essay: today's in-class assignment

Q: What was I trying to convey about literacy in my visual essay?
A: I tried to convey how I learned to read and write. I also tried to show where I am now in my skeleton of a creative writing path. In other words, it isn't much , but it may lead somewhere again, if that makes sense.

Q: What parts worked best? Why?
A: I think what works best in my essay is the lack of flesh because it leaves much to the imagination, and yet it reveals more than one might initially think. It is as if you are looking at an invisible woman, but it is really an invisible man (based on my female pseudonym). Irony never fails to find its way into my writing, whatever kind of text makes no difference.

Q: Which had the most impact? Why?
A: The biggest impact may be the link behind the glasses because (1) it is one of the most amazing views from the top of Mount Everest; (2) it is even interactive as you can direct the computer which direction to look from the top.

Q: What parts worked less well? Which had the least impact? Why?
A: The lips did not work so well because I originally intended them to burp, but to get the burp you would have to be redirected to another site and link, and I just wound up hating the idea that it would not be an instant burp. So I ended up directing the link to an image of the Stones' Tattoo You album. It is probably not obvious how that even relates to literacy, except that tattoos are a form of imagery and text.



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