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For once I'm going to make it short. I crewed for a Brother Sun concert tonight, and then brought one of the musicians home with me*. They're an amazing trio of singer/songwriters who have all made a living from their music for years before they joined together. Their harmonies are so tight you can't slip a hair between them. The concert was great, but as always, striking the stage and packing up the gear takes almost as long as the music lasted. And it's all worth it.

My muse Dolores had such a good time she fell asleep on the couch and has nothing to whisper in my ear. So I'm going to cop out and share a video from a house concert somewhere else of one of the songs the group sang tonight. If you like it, you should check out some of their other videos and buy their CD.

* Really? You had to go there? I bring home a talented, intelligent, red-headed music man and immediately you thought about cookies, didn't you? Sorry to turn down the oven, but he's happily married and just needed a place to camp for the night. We ate pulled pork and talked about teaching. But you should still buy their CD.

Would the pervert in the class please raise his hand?

Today a colleague posted an article about a 56-year-old college student in Michigan who has been severely reprimanded by Oakland University officials. Joseph Corlett claims all he did was write in his class journal that his teacher was "tall, blonde, stacked, smart, articulate." Those five adjectives earned him a three-semester suspension. In addition he's not allowed on the campus and he has to go to a therapist. Spanked and sent to the corner for 5 words. Or at least that's what he would have us believe.

Neither the teacher nor the university have commented, and they won't as long as Corlett is threatening a law suit. I've been in a position like that, where I couldn't talk about a messy situation because I was in a position of responsibility, but others could tell any lies they wanted--and I couldn't defend myself. It's amazing how blatant the lies can get when one party can't tell the truth. So maybe I'm projecting, but even hearing just Corlett's side of the story, it sounds pretty fucking fishy. In fact I throw up the

A few points. 

1. One of the benefits of my age is that I don't really worry about my students, who are mostly 18-20 years old, crushing on me. I would, in fact, be amazed if a student has ever thought of me "that way."* I'm neither a MILF nor a TILF. My students write weekly letters to me though, and they tell me all kinds of personal stuff. If one of them wrote about my boobs in a letter he knew I was going to read and especially if that student were older than I am (and this asshole is even older than I am, so I feel comfortable assuming he's older than the professor), I would feel uncomfortable standing in front of the class and teaching after I'd read that entry. Yes, even I, a teacher who has talked about masturbation in class, would feel like wearing a zipped parka to class after I read that. It's fucking creepy. My nipples are inverted just thinking about it.

I'll bet even my male colleagues would choose to teach from behind the desk if a female student wrote to one of them about his large package or wondered about the size of his dick in her journal. None of us want to think our students are sitting there staring at our boobs and filling up their wank banks.

2. Even writing about it in a journal she's going to read makes him a fucking perv. But it's also, at the very least, disingenuous for him to claim that this is the only sexually explicit thing he wrote. He admits he asked her many times if there were any restrictions on the sexual content of the journals. What student has to ask that question? My students ask if they can swear in their narrative arguments. Or if they can use contractions. Or how long the paper has to be, but they don't ask if they can talk about my boobs--lovely as my boobs are. Then again, so far none of them have been creepy perverts.

3. I wouldn't be surprised if this student had made inappropriate comments before--and many of them. And either because he lacks empathy or because he's a fucking sociopath who just likes to get negative attention, he kept doing it even though other people were obviously uncomfortable. I can imagine the teacher has been uneasy about the "sexual undertones" in his writing, and that other students were as well and complained to her about him. Anybody want to guess those undertones showed up in his spoken words too?

Fiction-writing classes attract all kinds of writers, including "that guy." That guy who wants women to read his poorly written BDSM porn and make comments on it. That guy who likes to pretend he's an "honest" writer, one who doesn't need to observe normal social boundaries because he's an artist. He's that old guy who buys a camera and tries to talk young women into posing nude for him. When I read this article, what I saw was "that fucking creeper guy." I've taken classes with him.

 4. Universities bend over backwards for students. In fact, many teachers are concerned about the "student as customer" attitude some universities have assumed. No university official wants to slap a student up the side of the head like this guy was. This wasn't a failing grade and you don't get to take the class again. This was we won't even take your fucking tuition money and here's a restraining order and you must get medical attention. This was a mushroom cloud. He could have plagiarized Jesus and the university wouldn't have spanked him this hard.

There's no way we're getting all of the story from this fucking attention whore guy. I'd be willing to bet a dozen cookies the facts are even worse than I can imagine. We won't know until it goes to court or until other students come forward and start telling stories. My money is on the latter.

5. This guy's lawyer sounds like an even bigger idiot than he is. In the article he's cited as saying this student's right to free speech has been breached. What a dumbass. This guy does not have a right to write or say anything he wants in a college class and expect the Constitution to protect his perverted ass. The lawyer goes on to say this guy has a constitutional right to a college education. What the fuck? Really? Because in that case about 75% of the residents of this city need to sue ..... somebody because they don't have college degrees. Nobody has a constitutional right to attend a university. If I hadn't already decided the student might be a fucking pervert, I would know he's an asshole just by his association with his ambulance-chasing lawyer.

The story so far has old fucking creeper guy written all over it -- and he's the only one telling the story. But I'll reserve judgement until when and if the teacher and the university have a chance to tell their side. I spend a lot of time in front of a classroom. I know there's more going on here than some poor, innocent college student writing in his little journal that his teacher is stacked. This guy masturbated in public and the university smacked him on the wee wee and sent him to the corner to think about it.

Then again. I could be wrong.

What do you think: pervert or wronged student?


 * I will admit there was one charming fellow who looked a lot like Tom Cruise in Risky Business and knew it. When I reprimanded him for coming to class late, he offered to let me spank him. I told him I'd rather he'd put his butt in the chair before I was ready to start the class. If I'm going to spank someone, it certainly won't be a student.

Wordless Wednesday: BLT

Suck it, Hallmark

For some reason, Valentine's Day was in my face like a slobbering pitbull this year. I usually don't pay that much attention to the day. But this year, the more I ignored it, the bigger it got. I saw at least 6397 posts about it on Facebook. My students wrote about it for a writing exercise we did in class. Last night Elvira and I went to Kroger about 7:00. The entire fucking store was pink and red, and it was filled with dazed men wandering around with cellophane-wrapped flowers in their hands looking for something else to buy because they knew just the flowers weren't going to be enough. Valentine zombies.

Telling that story about the year LtColEx stole my gift got me to thinking about other Valentine's Days in recent years, and wondering if a woman only gets one super-romantic, larcenous, heart-shaped gesture in her life. I mean, sure, one will inevitably rise to the top, but is it too much to ask for a top ten five? Here, in reverse chronological order are my most memorable Valentine's Days of the past few years.

Last year I was dating a guy who sent me a text that read: "Happy socially imposed day of romantic recognition, baby." I laughed. I didn't expect anything more. He suffered from unusual allergies.

The year before that, I was seeing a guy who played me songs on my guitar for hours and got drunk. I didn't laugh. I didn't expect anything more. He had a large capacity for vodka, but it wasn't limitless.

Before that, I was in a relationship with a guy who brought me gifts: black silky boxers with red metallic hearts, a small box of chocolates from Odd Lots, and a simple card. I didn't expect anything more. I was surprised that he brought the exact same gifts for Elvira though. It was unusual opening Valentine's Day gifts from my lover with my daughter and seeing the same things come out of both giftbags. I laughed though. He wasn't comfortable with "socially imposed" gift giving, but he gave thoughtful, generous, often romantic, gifts when he was inspired or when he knew I needed something.

Before that I was married. Usually LtColEx picked up a dozen red roses and a box of Esther Price chocolates at the grocery store on his way home from work, and I cooked a special dinner that we ate with the kids. We probably had sex after they went to bed. I didn't expect anything more.

Thor. Mine.

See what I mean? I'm due a new and better story. A really fucking sexy, romantic story with lots of cookies in it. One I wouldn't even dare tell here because it would singe your eyes and make parts of your body throb.

As it is, all V Day means to me is that I'd better make sure I've got a full charge on my Vibrator. (Get it? V day? It's not as funny when I have to explain.)

Not that I'm really complaining. I'm not. This year Montana mailed me a Valentine gift bag filled with Dove darks and Lindt Lindor truffles. And a Valentine from her, Drake, and Thor -- because she knows I love me a Viking, and the only thing better than a Viking is a Viking god. (That girl is a keeper. She's choosing my nursing home, not Elvira.)

And I spent the evening with Coraline, the diva of sweetness, so Elvira could get laid enjoy a romantic interlude with her man. She showed up with a card from her, Rock Dad, and Coraline that she'd made this afternoon. Inside the card was a poem she wrote just for me.

Maybe I shouldn't have read Poe aloud while she was in my womb.

Valentine's Day: it's not all about the obligatory hearts and flowers you know.

The best gift he ever stole for me

The theme at last night's story slam was love. Risking the  trite, and because there were children in the audience, I told a Valentine's Day story that happened a long time ago, in another life.

LtColEx and I were married for many years. Decades even*. Over most of those years we were comfortable, financially secure, and he gave me many Valentine's Day gifts. Depending on where the Air Force had sent him that year, I got Godiva chocolate from Belgium, Opium perfume from France, jewelry, lingerie, or, most often, a dozen roses and a box of Esther Price mixed chocolates that he picked up at the grocery store on his way home from work. I appreciated them all, but I have to admit, no matter what he gave me, my favorite gift was always the one he gave me the first year we were married. The year I least expected a gift.

The first few months of our marriage we lived in a roach-infested trailer in a crappy fucking trailer park in Red Oak, Iowa. I worked in a commercial greenhouse; he cleaned carpets. We hated it, and we knew our only hope of escaping the family farm fate was for him to get back into college. The plan was for me to work while he went to school, and then he would get a good job and I'd get my degree.

So in January we moved back to Iowa City, where we'd met, into married student housing, and he went to school while I worked. It took a long time for me to find a job in a small city with a large student population. I finally took a job that was so demeaning I won't even say what it was. I worked almost every day, often for 10-12 hours, but they paid me cash after every shift, so I could buy food on my way home and set a little aside for the rent.

We were so poor, we usually only ate once a day. In the month or so before I found a job, we would go three or four days on a loaf of day-old bread from the bakery that cost twenty-five cents. LtColEx's grandma had given us a quart of apple butter and a pint of crab apple jelly -- the sourest, meanest jelly ever made. We stretched that out as far as we could. One night we didn't have enough money to buy food, so I made pancakes with the last of our Bisquick and some water, and put a little ketchup in a can of pork 'n beans. We ate baked beans on pancakes. It's not a recipe I plan to pass on.
 
 After I finally broke down and took the worst job in the city, we could buy a Swanson pot pie for each of us every day, because they only cost a quarter apiece and they were hot food.

On Valentine's Day that year I'd worked so many days in a row, I couldn't remember the last time I'd had a day off. I finally dragged my tired ass home about midnight, along with a couple of Swanson pot pies. I probably didn't even remember what day it was. It didn't matter. We didn't have money for gifts anyway.

I heated the oven and put in the pot pies. They take forever to bake. I sat down to watch anything on TV that would take me out of that tiny apartment with the cinder block walls and the cheap white sheet over the window.

"Close your eyes," LtColEx said. He was standing with his hands behind his back.
"I don't need a surprise tonight," I said.
"Just close your eyes and hold out your hands."
"Fine." I did as he asked.
He put something in my hands and then said, "Happy Valentine's Day. I love you."

I looked down at the heart-shaped gift in my lap. It was wrapped in a piece of notebook paper on which he'd drawn a heart and colored it with crayons. He'd written "I love you" across the front of the heart. I carefully took off the wrapping and saw he'd taken a pot pie tin and shaped it into a heart. In the pan were 8 pieces --two whole packages -- of Toffifay, my favorite candy. The sweetest thing I'd eaten in weeks was that bitter fucking crab apple jelly.


I picked up one of the candies. "Where did you get this? We can't afford candy." It smelled so good.
"It doesn't matter. I had to get you a Valentine's Day present."
"No, really. How did you get these?"
"OK, I walked to the grocery store this evening, and I stole them. I couldn't not get you a present for our first Valentine's Day."

I couldn't believe it. We were poor. Really poor. But we didn't steal, and we sure as hell couldn't afford for him to get arrested. I looked down at the pie tin heart and the notebook wrapping paper with its crayon message ... and the 8 pieces of my favorite candy. I could smell the pot pies getting toasty in the oven. And I looked up at the man who'd walked in the bitter Iowa cold to the grocery store to steal me some Valentine candy, and I think I knew even then that nobody would ever give me a better gift than that.

I hugged him and kissed him and offered him one of the Toffifays, but he wouldn't take one. He watched while I ate every single one --after I ate my pot pie, of course -- first peeling away the caramel and then nibbling the chocolate and hazelnut in the tiniest bites I could take. Before I went to bed, I wrapped the paper around the aluminum heart again and put it in my dresser drawer. Eventually I threw the pot pie pan away, but I kept the crayoned wrapping paper.

A couple of years ago, after our long, bitter divorce, when I was going through stuff, getting our big tri-level in the suburbs ready to sell, I came across my memorabilia box in the attic. In it I found my suede leather jacket with the long fringe, which still smelled like .... umm, patchouli ... low-slung, bell-bottom jeans that looked like they'd fit a nine-year-old, a silver mini dress that Elvira wouldn't believe was really a dress. And the piece of notebook paper with a red heart colored on it in crayon.

A lot had happened since I opened that stolen Valentine's Day present. That young man who loved me like I was precious was long gone, and so was that tired teen-aged girl. What the hell though. I tucked the paper back in the box with the other memories and moved it with me to a new house in the city. It's still the best Valentine I ever got.


What's the best Valentine you ever received? What gift made you feel most precious?


* I was, of course, still a child on my wedding day.