The father of my “children” is kind, patient, responsible, careful, fun, and an all round good guy.  He is my own Dear Husband.  I’m so grateful for him and to him.  When he accompanied me in the “delivery room” the first time, he was the first father to have done so in that hospital.  He attended the birth of each of our children, and our miscarriage.  In those times, his stature in my eyes increased so much so that it could never diminish.

As a father, he was not only responsible in providing house and home for the children, he was also a participating parent.  He changed diapers, he played with the children, he read to them, he told stories, and he guided the children in their growth.  Perhaps at some times, I thought I needed more from him, and perhaps the children would have liked more attention, but in retrospect, I see what a wonderful father he was while they were growing up, and still is now in an adult to adult way.

So, thanks, Dear Husband for who you are, and what you do.

To my son who is a new father, I am certain you are an excellent father because you are sensitive to the needs of others.  You are kind, generous, careful, responsible, and attentive.  Your children are blessed in you.

To my son-in-law, the father of three fine boys, I say I admire you and appreciate you.  I see the children look up to you.  I see the work you do.  I see your commitment to your family. I see you reading to the boys, with special voices and drama.  I hear you sing and play the violin with your son.  You have blessed our whole family.

And to the husband of our dear young friend who is as close as a daughter: Your road has not been easy, and the newest twists in that road make it more difficult than ever.  Not only are you a father, but you are about to be a grandfather! You are a man of courage and kindness, patience and forbearance.  I am grateful to you.

My own father, and my father-in-law, both now deceased, were fine men, courageous, faithful, brave, and honest.  One’s father provides the definition of a MAN.  I’m so grateful to the men in my life: father, brothers, sons, and of course my Dear Husband.  It isn’t easy today, and perhaps never was, for men to be fathers, to know, love, and care for their children, while working to provide the basics for them, and maintaining marriage as well. So to those who do their best in spite of all odds, all brokenness, all mistakes, errors, and poor judgment of one kind and another, keep up the good work.  Your own children need you, their mothers need you, and we all need you.

I have finished my classes; I have turned in my grades.  I received affirmation from the majority of my students, and a few comments such as “sometimes you were boring,” just to keep me humble.

We were so excited about serving in the volunteer summer program.  It does seem that there is one glitch after another.  It also seems that China is not really interested in volunteers, since it is so difficult to get the proper paperwork.  The newest thing is that the required document lists “first entry” as July 1, when we have to fly out of Hong Kong June 28 in order to have the training for the program.  It becomes more clear why Chinese people seldom plan anything in advance.  We have already paid for the hotel in Hong Kong.  We have paid for the ticket to Beijing.  We have paid for the ticket home on August 5.  This adds up to a lot of money to lose.  It’s all so wearing.  I do think that my own country is probably equally frustrating when it comes to “red tape” as my folks used to call it.  We just don’t normally have to deal with it.

The weather is hot, what a surprise for summer time.  In the USA, we’re accustomed to going anywhere we have to go in an air conditioned car.  Here we walk.  So, the weather is more important.  I have a small problem in my left ear.  I may need to go the clinic for help.  For this, I will need an interpreter.  My voice recital rehearsal has been changed, as has my lesson, so the net effect is, I’ve had my last lesson, unless we could meet Saturday. The recital is Monday.  I’m singing a Chinese folk song, which I have not completely memorized yet–that’s this afternoon. And,I’m singing an English song, for which the tune is Lyra Davida, and the words were written by C. Wesley.

Getting ready to go seems overwhelming at this time.  So, although I am known here as “positive, upbeat, and always smiling” I confess I am in a snit.  Let us hope for resolution of all the problems, one way or another.

We leave here on June 22, less than three weeks left!  We still have classes, grading, an English Corner, and some dinners to attend.  We’re paring down our “stuff” and planning for the summer program we will serve.

We have to change our visa from one category to another, and this change requires a trip to Hong Kong.  I’ve often wanted to go there, so I’ve reconciled the extra cost.  Also it will allow us to visit some former students.  That trip will take place at the end of this month.

There’s a lot of detail to take care of in these coming weeks, but we’re plugging away at it.  One exciting thing for me is the upcoming voice student recital, June 18.  I’m supposed to sing two songs, one a traditional American song usually sung in the Spring time, and the other a traditional Chinese song. For the American one, I have sung the tune all my life, but the words are different from the ones I’ve known.  I have to memorize both songs.  Wish me well.

My teacher is excellent.  She has taught me more in these few months than I have learned in a lifetime of choir singing.  When I was very young, I hoped to be a singer, but as time went on, that dream seemed impossible.  Now, however, this late in life, I will sing a solo.  My teacher wants her students to see that it is never too late to learn something new.

We’re quite excited about the summer program.  It is a new phase of this well established program.  We’ll be training teachers who will train other teachers.  So, it will be mostly methodology, not all the “cultural exchange” that happens in the regular program.  Our trainees have already attended the main program, and this will be considered “advanced.”   We’re honored to be part of this special team.

I’ll try for a few more posts in the next weeks, but then, there may a stretch of silence.  After we return home, I’ll start again.  Keep checking in though, you never know what you’ll find.

A few days ago, on the city bus, I saw someone using his cell phone, texting, and talking, checking a written chart, and smoking, all at the same time.  It was the driver.

Today on our walk, we saw a car stalled at the intersection, with a truck and a bus lined up behind it.  We heard the driver pop the clutch.  He couldn’t go forward.  The truck driver started yelling at him.  The light changed again.  I asked Dear Husband, “Do you think you could help him?”  So, husband walked into the street and leaned into the car to motion that the emergency brake was on, that’s one reason he couldn’t go forward. This was easy for us to observe, but difficult for the driver to grasp.  When he released that brake, the car started rolling backward.  Husband held the car steady, then went around to the driver’s side of the car to lean in.  Of course, the driver was nervous by this time, with the truck driver yelling and then the bus pulling around on the right side.  Since we speak no Mandarin, and the driver spoke no English, Husband used hand motions to show how to ease up on the clutch while easing down on the accelerator.  After another light change, the car moved forward smoothly.

Yesterday I went with a colleague to some tailor shops to see about ordering another classic Chinese dress.  I thought we’d be taking a taxi, but instead, the teacher’s husband drove us in his car.  The teacher told me that she has had a driver’s license for six years, but her husband won’t allow her to drive alone.  I told her I had been driving for nearly fifty years, but I wouldn’t want to drive in China.  It’s much better to let someone else drive.

I am often frustrated by my inability to get through to my students.  I wrote a note in my class book, “I often feel like a first year teacher; so much more to learn.”  I don’t know for sure how first year teachers feel, but I feel that I am not completing my task.

I think of myself as a student, and I remember my best teachers.  I have excellent models for teaching, so I try to remember what those teachers did.  In every case, the answer is that the students had to participate in doing the work, whatever it was.  For example, in the quilt club, to use a non school setting, the teacher showed her own work, and made a step by step presentation of how to do it.  Then the learners went to their machines and did the task, bringing it back to the teacher for comment. Sometimes, the teacher said, “No, this isn’t right,” and I had to do it again. But, the joy when she said “Nice work” was deeply satisfying.

In my writing classes, I use the class time for the students to write.  Then I read their work and make comments on each paper.  Next, I use that very work for examples of problems, or of good work — if I can find any — in the following classes.  In my four sophomore writing classes, our goal is a standard format five paragraph essay.  Alas, some students write three. In my three freshman classes, our goal is one coherent paragraph. Alas, some students write three.   I have said repeatedly, “A paragraph, for our purposes, must have more than one sentence.”  Alas, the one sentence paragraph is popular.  We have fairly good textbooks, but the students don’t do their homework.  I was shocked to learn that the students had never learned the basic rules of punctuation or capitalization.  Six of the seven classes meet only every other week, so in the six weeks remaining of the term, they will each meet only three times.  Then I must give an exam that they can pass.  It won’t be acceptable for them to fail.

Do I really want to spend that final week reading student work that is barely passable, and marking it with a passing grade?  Maybe not.  So, I am searching for an exam idea that all may pass and that will be easy for me to grade.  Perhaps a “fill in the blank” style reading.  Thus have I arrived at the feeling that it doesn’t matter much what I do.  I fight the feeling and keep looking for snappy ways to get the students’ attention.  I keep looking for the light to go on.  I keep hoping for a paper that shows that the light has gone on.  Of my 215 students, maybe 10 can write a coherent paragraph or essay, but they will still have problems with the verb tenses and sentence structure. Does this fact mean that I have failed to teach them how to write English?

In the midst of my feelings of failure comes a note from a former student: “You taught us so much more than English.”  What will my focus be for the final three classes?  Life skills, or proper capitalization?  Actually, knowing what deserves a capital letter and what does not is a life skill.  When is life at a comma, just a pause, or when a period, full stop?  When should we declare, when ask, when exclaim, and how do we know? All valuable life questions.  My choice at this juncture is to exclaim, “Onward!”

Julia is distressed by  the name of Mr. Obama’s campaign cartoon figure.  Mr. O’s “Julia” is faceless, shameless, and spineless. Why did Mr. O’s “Julia” take seven years to graduate from college, even though she had Pell grants and loans to cover the exorbitant cost of tuition?  She “chose” to have a child, but apparently she did not “choose” to have a husband. Does she know any of the research about fatherless children?  Poor Zach, he didn’t even get to go to Head Start.    At 65, Mr. O’s  “Julia” is drug dependent.  Is this a carry over from the days of her youth?  At 67, this “Julia” retires “comfortably” on her Social Security.  Where, Julia wonders, does she live?  Mexico perhaps, or Haiti?

Julia’s own Dear Husband worked for more than 50 years, paying 15% of his income to Social Security taxes for most of that time, in addition to federal and state income taxes.  Julia herself worked part time and temporary jobs while being a full time mother and homemaker.  They began to hear in the 1970’s that Social Security Benefits would not be available to them, but were barely able to fund any retirement accounts until the most recent few years.   Without a pension, they would not be able to own a house, or to go abroad to find work in China.

Julia notes that both she and her husband graduated from college, husband with advanced degree, without any loans at all.  However, their children are saddled with years of debt from their advanced degrees.  The cost of schooling has risen out of all proportion to the rest of the economy.  Is it because the federal student loan program increased the prices that could be charged?

Julia has had no health insurance since her Dear Husband retired.  His employer could not afford to continue the insurance plan, as it had for an earlier generation.  Is it because the insurance business has made the cost of medical care higher?  Julia does take one regular medication, and has noted, after all the years of paying the “copay” for it, that it is actually cheaper without insurance than it was with the “copay.”   When she goes to the doctor for the annual exam, Julia pays the clinic!

How long does Mr. Obama think his “Julia” will live?  When she is 90, will she still be “comfortable” on her social security payment?  Will she be able to have the medicine she needs at that time? Will she be regarded as no longer important?  Will her son support her, or will he have been killed in some far off war?  These questions are conveniently left unanswered.

The real Julia regrets that her name, a name with a long and distinguished history, is degraded by this campaign cartoon. But she regrets even more that her own beloved native land is deceived by the idea that people cannot stand up for themselves and be personally responsible. She further regrets that people have so ignored their spiritual lives, that they think so fragile an institution as a human government can provide for their needs throughout their lives. Dear Readers, Wake up!  Stand up! Speak up!

Today marks the one year anniversary of this blog.  When my daughter asked, “What is your purpose?” I answered, “Simply to START WRITING.”  Ann B. Ross, one of my favorite current writers says, “To be a writer, you must write.” So, I have used this blog as a way to write regularly. In my home are several of those portable file boxes full of stuff I have written.  I often made a good start, only to fizzle out in the middle.  All my life, I have wanted to “be a writer” and by this I meant, to be paid to be a published writer.  The realization of that goal is still to come, but meanwhile, I find the blog to be an outlet at least, and a beginning of discipline.  This medium is another aspect of the modern world that I find fascinating.

Last year at this time, we were preparing to go to China, now we are preparing to go home.  We had a “visa issue” last year, and this year, we have a “visa issue” again.  We’ll be making a trip to Hong Kong to resolve the issue.  Our son said, “Hong Kong might be fun,” and that is the way we have to see it.  The new high speed train from Wuhan to Shenzhen is now in operation, and we plan to use it.  We’ll visit some former students on the way and then go into Hong Kong to change our visas to the appropriate ones for volunteering.  Finally, we’ll fly to Beijing to start the training for the volunteer program.  After putting in a whole school year, the one month program will seem short, and then we’ll be on the way home.

One year complete, another beginning.  Here’s to living life as a continual adventure, to writing about the adventure, and to laughing our way through.  Raise a glass with me wherever you are.   Onward!

The cleaning men did a remarkable job.  They acquired a ladder which was quite helpful.  The maintenance man arrived and put new screens on the bedroom and bathroom  windows, and also in the bedroom in 101. He replaced the plastic toilet seat, which had mold imbedded in it.  The curtain man came and put up the rod and curtains in 201 and also repaired the brackets in 101, should we want to move back down after the ants and the DDT fumes subside.  I’ve washed more curtains.  We’ve carried our clothes upstairs, and we’ve begun to pack up the winter things to send home.  The procedure for that is another whole story, but at least, we have a start on it.  Perhaps tomorrow we can get 101 organized again, and shut the door on the bedroom.  I  did find a live ant in the drawer, and only a few dead ones, when we took out our clothes.  So, now, we’ll have our study, kitchen and living room in 101, and our bedroom and clothes in 201.  And we’ll have 2 bathrooms!  Just like home.  And, maybe by Tuesday, which is supposed to be a holiday, we can start reading and grading papers to be ready for next week’s classes.

Last week after class, just as I was approaching the bus, I was given a simple Rubik’s cube, an 8 block one.  The children waiting for the bus were excited about it, so I handed it to them.  They played with it the whole ride home.  I had given a cube having six distinct colors, one per face, and I received a cube having multicolored sides.  In case I did not have enough frustration, living in discord with the ants and all, I had this new puzzle to work.

I set it on my desk and looked at it now and then.  I thought of a young boy in Iowa who delights in this puzzle, and can quickly solve it, no matter how many blocks are involved. I wondered what was required to do that.  I thought of going online to find the clues, but decided to try on my own first.  Since 1974, when this puzzle was invented, I have never solved it, though I have tried.  Gradually I realized that one must look at it from all angles, as it were.  You can’t just try to get all the blue, for example, on one side, you have to arrange the four blue faces in the way that the other sides line up also.

I’m pleased to report that last night, sitting in the clean bed in the clean room in apartment 201, that I finished solving the cube.  It’s a small thing in my daily life, but it meant that I can still enjoy a puzzle. It’s a small thing in my China experience, but it meant that I still can focus and find a solution.  It’s a small thing in view of eternity, but for me it meant that everything will be solved eventually, by the one who can see all the sides at once.

There are many kinds of ants, too many to list.  Ants live in colonies headed by queens and composed of worker ants.  When a colony becomes quite large, the ants know they need to form new colonies.  Special reproductive ants are formed. They have wings.  There will be a few females and many males.  In the spring, when there is a heavy rain followed by a bright sunny day, these special reproductive ants from several colonies will swarm looking for mates.  After the ants copulate in the air,  the males die.  A female can mate with several males.  The females then begin making their new nests which will eventually become new colonies.  I have enough mind left to find all these facts which I learned on Monday evening fascinating.

In the bedroom of Apartment 101 in the Foreign Experts Building, The ants swarmed and formed at least 8 new nests before we started killing them.  Late on Monday night (see previous post) we felt we could rest safely in our bed.  On Tuesday there was more rain, and on Wednesday another glorious day of sun.  The ants swarmed again but died before they could mate, since we had sprayed so heavily. We swept them up.

Apartment 201 is now vacant, and since we had been expecting a guest, we had the key for it. I hadn’t wanted to start cleaning it and suggested the guest could stay at a hotel.  On Thursday the guest said she couldn’t come after all.

On Thursday, the ants swarmed again.  We didn’t sweep up.  We called the official.  She brought the maintenance man who, when he saw the hundreds of dead ants on the floor and on the bed, called the head of his department.  He said that the professional exterminators would be called and they could come Saturday.  We thought about sleeping in 201, but it was so dirty, and we have such wonderful light blocking curtains which we provided for 101.  I didn’t want to move.

On Friday afternoon, the so called professional team arrived and decided the ants are coming through the window screens and sprayed heavily around the windows.

On Saturday, the ants swarmed again, and the curtain rod fell off the wall.  So, we began to clean 201, spending about 5 hours to do the bedroom and wash some curtains to put up there for the night.  I emailed the official, not expecting any reply, but within an hour she came with the person immediately above her, and a person from the science department who has a PhD and studies insects.  She also thinks they come through the windows, although on the first days, the windows were not open.  She explained the mating process, the rain, the sun, all of which I already knew.  She said, “We have to find the main nest.”  I restrained myself from saying, “DUH.”  Then she said it would be very difficult to do.

We had a conversation about cleaning in 201.  I explained to the officials that I would clean the apartment to my standards and submit my bill to the department.  I mentioned a figure I had paid in the USA several years ago for professional cleaning.  Quick calculations were done and she called the cleaning service arranging for them to come Sunday.

We slept well in 201 and started Sunday with renewed spirits.  The “professional” cleaning men have arrived on a scooter, two men who look straight from the countryside, straw hats and ill fitting clothing.  They brought no equipment of their own.  The official said that we should make sure they clean to our standards.  This means constant supervision.  Husband is doing this, I can’t bear to watch.

Last night the main official responded to Husband’s email by giving us a rundown of the sex life of ants, as if we weren’t aware.  He said that this is common here in south China in the spring.  It reminds me of an incident many years ago when I was invited with some other women to a luncheon.  The hostess was not quite ready when we arrived, and had run upstairs for finishing touches to her dress.  She had set a pitcher of iced tea on the counter.  Her cat leaped to the counter and putting his head into the pitcher began to drink the tea.  Alarmed, we called out to her, “The cat is in the tea.”  “That’s ok,” she said, “He likes tea.”