The Simple Life

I like Real Simple. I'm a big fan. Love their ideas about double duty household items and their tips for how to get things clean and organized. I'm just not so sure how simple Real Simple is anymore.

I was browsing through the April issue when I came upon a special feature in their style section about colorful handbags, subheaded: "12 vivid purses to light up your life." I scanned the pictures first. Colorful indeed -- there were purses in every color of the rainbow, and one in hot pink to boot. They came in all shapes and sizes, in designs fit for formal and informal occasions.

There was one on the last page of the spread that I really liked -- a cute little green one that would match the color of my Beetle -- until I took a peek at the price. It was a Marina Rinaldi and came in at a cool $620.00. Okay, so it's "beautifully crafted of ostrich-embossed leather" and made by a designer whose name sounds Italian (translation: expensive). I should have known.

And while the kelly green shoulder bag was the most expensive on its page, it was not the most expensive in the four-page spread. No, that distinction belonged to a bright turquoise blue Miu Miu (not to be confused with the oversized colorful house dresses of a similar name), made of "luxurious Italian leather." Sure, the blurb acknowledged that it was a "splurge," but I can't say I understand just what makes this bag "supremely special," besides the fact that it costs more than most major kitchen appliances.

As I kept looking, I discovered that $50.00 would land me a "seriously spacious" patent-leather carry-all in lipstick red (the cheapest on their list), and after that I could get a matching Banana Republic clutch in shiny red patent-leather big enough to hold my keys and driver's license for just under $100.00. Another real bargain! (Not!)

The average price of a purse in these four Real Simple pages? $375.50! Even without the unreasonable Miu Miu and the cheapest purse skewing the figures, the average remains above the $300.00 mark. Could the editors be suggesting that the simple life includes a $300.00+ purse?

So when I spend $19.00 on a designer (or no brand) handbag on the discount racks at TJ Maxx, am I committing a venial sin against rampant consumerism? Or am I just keeping it simple, for real?

The Poem Lady

Sorry I've been away, neglecting my bloggerly duties. It's not that I've given up hope on finding an audience or that I've decided that maintaining a blog AND a notebook are mutually exclusive, as some earlier entries may have implied. No, that's not what's kept me away. So where have I been?

I went back to school. Back to the high school I taught at for seven years, that is. But not as a full-time teacher. (I sent in my official resignation a few weeks ago.) For the past two weeks, I played the role of poet-in-residence at Montgomery Blair High School. April being National Poetry Month, it seemed a fitting thing to do.

Last spring, when I announced that I was leaving Blair to concentrate on my writing, one of the librarians approached me to ask if I would be at all interested in coming back to do a guest stint teaching poetry to students for two weeks in April. The poet who had done such a good job for the past two years (Carol Peck), would not be available, and they needed someone to take her place. Much to the librarian's surprise, I jumped at the chance. After all, I'd been telling everyone that my dream job would be doing creative writing with students without all of the grading that came with teaching it full time.

I'll admit I was more than a little nervous as the time drew near. The librarian sent me a class list that included everything from ESOL 4 to 12th grade Honors students. As I made my plans, two voices competed in my head: Poetry with high school students? What makes you think you can make them enjoy poetry? VS. You can do this in your sleep. Your creative writing students always loved what you did with poetry -- even the reluctant poets. I blocked them out as I planned four different activities to generate poems with the students, and I hoped for the best.

By the end of week one, I had worked with 10 different classes in 16 sessions, and I was more than satisfied with the quality of the poems the students were producing. The second week brought 10 new classes and 16 more sessions, which resulted in more than a few terrific poems. Even the class of 13 freshman boys and 1 girl -- the one I was most worried about -- seemed to be engaged. (I would post some of my favorites so you could see their creativity, but I have to get their permission first.)

I was pretty sure the students were enjoying our time together as much as I was, but it was something I overheard at lunchtime of week two that confirmed my suspicions. I was walking down the hall to return a stack of poems to one of the teachers, when I heard a student interrupt a conversation with his friend to say, "Hey, that's the poem lady!"

The poem lady!?! I could get used to that...