flatland

after work yesterday, i went to see 'hugo'. it was playing at the only theater within reasonable walking distance from my office and i'd heard good things about it. the movie didn't do much for me, but i appear to be in the minority, and this blog is not a review so i won't say much more. i was forced to see the movie in 3D because the theater gave me no other choice - it was only showing in 3D at that theater.

i don't like 3D movies (i may be in the minority about this too) and i don't understand what people get out of seeing a movie in 3D.

i've probably seen a dozen movies in 3D since the new 3D craze started, where every kids movie seems to have a 3D version. the thing is, i don't remember the 3D-ness of any of these movies.

i'm pretty sure i saw 'up' in 3D. that i have to say i'm 'pretty sure', tells me that the 3D-ness of the movie didn't stay with me. i know i saw 'avatar' in 3D, but i again don't remember the 3D-ness of the movie while i watched it, but the throbbing headache the 3D-ness gave me after, that lasted the rest of the day. in fact, for the most part, if i remember that i saw a movie in 3D, it is because i ended up getting a headache - yes, i'm one of those people who get headaches from 3D movies. i medicated myself before seeing 'hugo' because of this. if you have to take medication before you see a movie, it sucks when you walk out of it a little disappointed.

even without the headaches though, i don't think i've been blown away by anything i've seen in a 3D movie. am i missing something? the object that gets thrown at the camera gets old after the first time. the bubbles, or snow falling gets old - snow seemed to fall endlessly in 'hugo' (who knew it snows that much in paris? no one. because it doesn't). i find that kind of stuff a little annoying.

maybe i'm just a guy who doesn't like this (not-so) newfangled technology, or gets annoyed that i get headaches watching movies when people around me don't. maybe i'm behind the times, or don't want to spend that extra money to wear glasses that feel uncomfortable over my glasses, but i like my movies to look like what they are; images flashing on a flat screen.

that cold and damp feeling

a few weeks ago, while i was in baltimore, i was listening to the men in blazers podcast. a listener had written in asking why it was, that in open air football stadiums in the u.k., spectators were usually under some kind of cover where in many u.s. open air stadiums, spectators have to deal with the elements.

the humorous answer the men gave was that in the u.s., you can go home and have a heater in your house that actually keeps your house well-heated, but in the u.k., people who get stuck in a cold rain have been known to be cold and damp, for months.

i've had conversations with people, both before and since moving here, about how hard it is to get warm and dry after getting cold and wet in the u.k. i first heard it from a co-worker at de anza when i told her i was moving here; lauren mentioned the other day how she feels like her nose is always running (as is mine). there is just this cold and dampness that seems to stay with you all winter. you get chilled to the bone and can't thaw out until spring.

when i tell people from scotland that i moved here from california, one of the first questions i get is 'how are you coping with the winter weather?' the weather itself is not that bad - michigan winters are far worse, and even baltimore winters are worse than the winter weather i've experienced in edinburgh over the past 2 winters.

the difference is, both in michigan and in baltimore, i could always get warm in those places. here, getting warm means going into our flat that rarely seems to get above 18C (65F) at it's warmest, and this is after running the fireplace for several hours. even in my office (the warmest room i'm ever in) it often takes the bulk of the workday for my feet to warm up from the walk to work that morning. i then have to head home when they get cold again and stay cold til i've been under the duvet for an hour, when i go to bed.

one of the problems with our flat is the high ceilings - they are about 12 feet high. when we moved into it in august, i would look up and think 'what awesome high ceilings'; now i look up and shake my fist, envying the heat that sits up there while we shiver feet below, wishing we didn't move into a place with such high ceilings. we are currently thinking of moving into a more permanent place and we've now put high ceilings as a immediate 'no', when we look at places.

our high ceilings in warmer times (photo by lauren hall-lew)

thinking back to the men in blazers, the idea of going to an outdoor sporting event (even if it's to see hibs) at this time of year doesn't at all appeal to me. even going to a place like the 'winter wonderland' set up in the princes street gardens, for an hour, doesn't sound all that appealing, because i know i probably will not be able to warm up until some time after winter is over, after feeling cold and damp, for months.

winter wonderland in princes gardens

get me through december

i got an email today about a secret santa thing people at work want to do. my first thought? please god no - there's no way i'm doing this. it was voluntary, thank goodness, so i will not be taking part.

i've never been a big fan of holidays; it throws off my routine, and everyone around me always seems so much more excited about them than me.

i see people get excited about thanksgiving, or 4th of july, while i think to myself what am i going to do with myself on that day? i've never liked doing the traditional holiday things, like eating, or seeing fireworks, or parades.

i feel like getting excited about holidays the same way i feel about eating meat - i don't care if you want to do it, i just don't want to.

because of this anti-holiday guy that i am, december can be rough to get through - traveling (which i don't particularly enjoy), gift-buying (which i don't particularly enjoy), socializing (which i don't particularly enjoy), and general merriment.

i'm a little grinchy, to be honest.

the thing that i actually grew to like a great deal, about the month of december, was the annual mom birthday-gift-buying battle, and the mom birthday-gift-giving that happened on her birthday.

my mother's birthday is on the 25th of december and as an adult, i've seen that date far more as being my mom's birthday, than christmas.

the battle would begin by her saying she wanted nothing for her birthday. i would ignore this, then spend weeks trying to find the gift for the person who wants nothing. i never really enjoyed this, but did enjoy the back and forth we would have on the phone as i would try and get something out of her that would give me a hint about what might be the gift to get her that year.

i also always liked watching my mother open her birthday presents, somewhat embarrassed, saying 'thank you, uncle don' to my uncle, her brother-in-law. i liked the way she reacted to everyone making a fuss about her birthday, because she really wished we hadn't - really.

this will be the second year where that battle doesn't happen; where i won't hear my mother say 'thank you, uncle don'.

so, while i hope everyone has the december they wish for, and wish nothing but the best for you and your family this month, the grinchy, anti-holiday guy, just wants to get me through december, so i can start again.

giving cheers

as a boy in nigeria, i was surrounded by friends who did not speak english at home; in fact, they spoke a variety of languages. that’s what happens when you live on university housing, with people from all over the country (that has over 500 languages), and the world.

because of my semi-multi-lingual background and my being married to a linguist, and thus becoming an acquaintance of more linguists than any normal person probably should, i think i think about language more than the average joe, or morag.

i grew up hearing words that didn’t quite have an english translation, that were used in certain situations. sadly, i can’t remember any of them at this writing.

now, in scotland, i’ve had to learn when and how to use new words and one of them in particular, i’ve had a hard time figuring out when exactly to use.

i can now say i know what ‘hogmanay’ is, and how to pronounce it somewhat properly. i know how to say the word ‘ceilidh’, as long as i don’t have to read it – every time i see it written it takes me a second or two to figure out what i’m reading. i know when to use ‘wee’, although i almost never use it. i know how it feels to be ‘chuffed’ or ‘gutted’. but ‘cheers’ still gets me – it’s a word i hear used more than the rest of these and i’m in the position to use a lot, but i’m still working on exactly when and how to use it.

in my view, ‘cheers’ is like ‘thank you’-lite. i think it's even lighter than 'thanks'. when someone holds a door for you (which is what got me thinking about writing this blog, at the gym last night) you could say ‘thanks’ or ‘cheers’. when you get your change and receipt from the grocery store teller, you could say ‘thanks’ or ‘cheers’. where i’m not so certain is where the line is drawn – the line where you don’t say ‘cheers’, but do say ‘thank you’.

i would guess that that if you get a really awesome gift from someone, something you really wanted, you wouldn’t say ‘cheers’; you would say ‘thank you’. you wouldn’t say ‘cheers’ to a doctor, or anyone, who saved your life, you would say ‘thank you’. the question for me is when is that point where ‘cheers’ just does not cut it? when you come off almost making light of the situation by saying ‘cheers’ where you should be saying ‘thank you’.

so during this holiday week in the united states, when you are spending time with your family (which i won’t be, unfortunately), give cheers for the year you’ve had, and the people you love, and have a happy cheersgiving.

the envelope fairy

a little over a week ago, lauren and i were walking along a busy street when i saw 3 teenage kids running across the street. it looked like 2 of them were chasing the third. they caught up to him and started beating him up - punching and kicking him on the ground. i started walking faster toward them and saw another guy run across the street to get to them. by the time we got to him, his attackers were gone, so we helped him up and helped him gather his things.

i was really bothered by this, not just because of the beating, but because of where it happened. it was a few steps from a bus stop where at least 10 people stood, watched all this happen, and did nothing. i’ve been mugged before, and was not helped during the mugging. people who helped me up afterward told me they didn’t help during the mugging because they were worried the guys might have a knife and they didn’t want to put themselves in danger. i can understand that to some degree, but that all these people at the bus stop made no attempt to help the kid after the attackers had left, has really been gnawing at me - no one seemed to want to be the responsible person and help the kid out. they waited for the us, who were further away, to do anything.

over the last year, i’ve been struck by how much i’ve seen people wait for someone else to take care of some problem they have; to take responsibility.

i first noticed it with the snow. when it started snowing (and didn’t seem to stop) last november and december, i twice got into conversations with people where i mentioned that i was surprised nothing was being done to clear the snow, even as it was falling. both times i got a ‘what?!?’ kind of response. like, why would anyone want to do that? people were waiting for the snow to melt, for nature to take the responsibility of clearing the streets. of course, this didn’t happen and eventually, the transport minister stepped down because he wasn’t responsible enough to clear the snow.

at my job, i deal with people who are on the peripheries of my regular work. one of them once said ‘i don’t want to be responsible’ for something they were clearly supposed to be responsible for. there have been a number of back and forth issues i’ve noticed, that could have been done by someone, but didn’t, or got passed around so much until someone eventually took care of it, because no one wanted to be responsible.

i see my job as being a helper of students, which i very much enjoy. there have been so many times students have said i was the only person that had bothered to ask what their problem was before shooing them off, telling them ‘i can’t help’ without even hearing what they needed help with.

last week, a student came to my office because she had some questions about an area of the university i’m unable to deal with. i told her where she needed to go to deal with that kind of issue, and she was told they couldn’t help her. she came back to my office, so i called that office. they said they were the only office on campus that could help her, so she went back to the office and was able to get help the second time. why couldn’t she get help the first time? because someone in that office didn’t want to be responsible.

about 6 weeks ago i noticed an unopened envelope was in the hallway outside our flat. after it hadn’t moved for a week, i picked it up. it was addressed to our neighbor’s flat, but not to his name. i put it on his welcome mat, thinking he didn’t realize it was addressed to his flat. the next day, it was back to were it was in the hallway again - i put it back on his welcome mat. next day, hallway, then back to his welcome mat. he then put it on the edge of his welcome mat, where i felt it wasn’t blocking the way. it sat there for several weeks. it’s like he thought some envelope fairy would come and magically take away the envelope.

last week, i noticed the envelope was gone. the police knocked on our door that night. our neighbor’s flat had been broken into - ‘broken into’ is a strong phrase here because there was no forced entry. the cop said to me, ‘make sure your doors are locked when you leave home’. i’m guessing someone not responsible enough to deal with an envelope addressed to their flat is also not responsible enough to lock their door when they leave home. why a thief would also take an envelope is beyond me, but fairies might come in all shapes and sizes.

as i write this, there is another envelope on the ground floor of our flat, addressed to an address on the third floor. i’m too lazy to walk up an extra 2 flights of stairs, but i’ve seriously thought about putting it on that person’s welcome mat, to see what comes of it.

i can’t believe it’s a scottish thing, or a uk thing, because all the people i’ve worked closely with, and know on a personal level, are very responsible people. maybe i’m just becoming a bitter middle-aged man and maybe this has been happening around me for all of my life, and it’s just never bothered me before. or maybe, i’m one of the responsibility fairies - the people who say ‘someone’s got to do it, so it might as well be me.’

It doesn't rain as much as you'd think

At several points in the past few months I've posted pictures on facebook showing something I saw that caught my eye. On more than one occasion people have cracked a joke about how sunny it is in the picture.

I get the feeling that people in the US think it is gloomier in Edinburgh than it really is.

Over the past month, in an effort to not feel trapped in my office all day, I like to eat my lunch on a bench somewhere nearby. During this time, there have only been 2-3 days where I couldn't do this because of rain. Is balmy and warm when I sit outside? Not in the California sense of balmy and warm, but we are quite a bit further north than California, so it wouldn't be expected to be t-shirt weather in September (although it's supposed to be t-shirt weather tomorrow).

I found a chart that listed the number of rainy days in Edinburgh per month. It looks like it's about 1/2 the days, but there's rain and then there's rain. Most of the rain we get is not like a Baltimore thunderstorm on an August evening, or like the California winter rains that come in January or February. Most of the rain is more like a drizzle, or a light shower, that doesn't go on all day. There have been quite a few days where I've been walking around, on a sunny day, and have felt a drizzle, sometimes lasting 15-20 minutes. Days like that are great for rainbows, and I don't think most people would consider that a rainy day, but I'm sure it's listed as one.

Are there clouds in the sky in Edinburgh? Of course, but they are not gray all the time, as people may believe. We don't live in a gloomy, depressing city. I'm looking outside right now and I see white clouds, and a blue sky. Today is the kind of day people in East Lansing, Michigan look for on a football Saturday - a crisp day where it's cool enough to be jacket weather, but not cold enough to be coat weather; where it's warm enough to enjoy a football game, but not so warm that you want to leave after the first quarter.

Is the weather always like this? Of course not. You can't expect to have great weather all the time - no one can. We have bad days and good days; we have sunny days and rainy days; we have cold days and warm days (though never as warm or as cold as the mid-Atlantic states).

a rainbow in a moment of sun, cloud, and drizzle (photo by Lauren Hall-Lew)

Edinburgh is probably not the city you think it is, weather wise; it doesn't rain as much as you'd think.

10 years is a long time

I was watching the news today, talking about 9/11, and how people on United 93 called their family members. I only got my first mobile phone a few months before 9/11. At the time, I was surprised to learn that phones would be able to get a signal mid-flight. Ten years is long time.

I don't want to talk about what I did that day - everyone has their story, and I see no need to tell you mine. What I'm most struck by today, is just how different my life is now than it was then.

Ten years ago....

I hadn't started teaching at De Anza, I hadn't started the PhD I never finished, and I hadn't even thought of getting the MBA that I did finish.

I didn't have dreadlocks 10 years ago, and had no plans to grow them out again (I was in the 3-year hole between both rounds of dreads). I had no chickenpox scars, hadn't separated the shoulder that bothers me every time I go to the gym, had no idea how painful lower back pain could be, and I had only one tattoo.

I didn't know my wife existed ten years ago, much less that she would end up being from my father's home town. I didn't have any siblings-in-law ten years ago; two fewer people who called me 'uncle', one more person that called me 'grandson', and one more person who called me their son.

I wonder where life will take me in the next 10 years.

Fi with uncle Jeff (2002)

Maya with uncle Jeff (2008)

flying through the workday

i’ve been at this job for a little over a week. so far i’ve basically done three things: dealt with disclosure forms (criminal background checks), written letters verifying that students are indeed students, and added students into courses for the upcoming semester.

i guess i should say what i do, but i feel like i just did. i’m a student support officer at the moray house school of education, at the university of edinburgh. i’ve been told that the job goes through an annual cycle - right now, we are dealing with incoming students, which is why i’m working on criminal checks and enrollment. i’m not sure what exactly i will be doing once classes start - that’s one of the things that makes me excited, but nervous, about the job.

the building my office is in

most days, i feel like my job is like a transatlantic flight. first, in terms of length. my work day is 7 ½ hours, similar to a transatlantic flight, but also the flow of the day matches my experience on long flights.

when i get to work, there is a flurry of activity; things have come in that need to be dealt with, overnight emails are responded to, and there is just this energy in the office. much like the first hour or two of a transatlantic flight - the safety information, the anticipation of the flight taking off, the take off, the leveling off, the ‘now you can use approved devices’, and the first meal (if there’s more than one) or drinks. then, you hit the middle several hours of the flight; the dull hours.

i’m restless during those hours, hoping there is something decent to do on the multi-media screens these flights have. maybe a decent movie, maybe an episode of ‘how i met your mother’, just to kill some time. work is similar in the middle hours.

not much happens after my coworker leaves at 12.30 (she works ½ days). i eat my lunch then i sit and wait. i listen to my now dwindling number of podcasts, hoping a student comes by with a disclosure form, to give me something to do. a call may come in, which is a good and bad thing - getting a call gives me something to do, but i hope the person on the other end of the line doesn’t have an accent i might have problems with. i play around online a bit. all of this is like finding that not-so-crappy movie, that ‘how i met your mother’ episode to help pass the time.

then, the last hour arrives - 3.30. only one more hour to go. i start counting down the minutes to get out of this seat, this room, this building, this plane i’ve been on for the past 6 ½ hours. i watch the clock, watch the location of the plane get closer and closer to my destination, listen to a podcast or two, knowing that when the podcast ends, there will only be x minutes.

the plane decends, the day ends. the servitor in our building comes through to lock things up, the flight attendants come by one last time. i deplane, i walk out of the building, into the mass of people at the airport, or on the royal mile. i make my way through the people, looking for the bus, or car that will take me home. the flight is over, the day has ended - i’m homeward bound.

the cake that looked like a train

I was talking to my sister, Emily, on her birthday the other day. I brought up that I didn't remember anything about my 30th birthday (it was her 30th birthday) and it got me thinking. I generally don't remember my birthdays. I've never been the kind of person to celebrate birthdays (I told my family that this year, the only thing I wanted for my birthday, is nothing), so birthdays never stick out for me. I've spent the last few days trying to remember birthdays past, and this is what I remember.

34 - I remember this birthday only because I spent it traveling from Edinburgh to Towson, by trains, planes, and automobiles. I forgot it was my birthday, until I landed in JFK that night and the immigration guy wished me a happy birthday. I spent the last minutes of my 34th wandering around Reagan National Airport, trying to find a place where I could sleep on the floor.

33 - I remember 33 because it was the first day in what was the worst year of my life. The day itself was not particularly memorable. Lauren and I went to Stacks, and I was again disappointed by what I got there (I know people love that place, but it's never done much for me). We also saw 'Up'.

28 - I decided to fast on my 28th birthday - no food for 24 hours. Some people are gluttonous on their birthdays; I decided to be the opposite. Of course, this lack of food gave me a migraine and I ended up feeling really crappy.

25 - The third of what I like to think of my international birthday trilogy. I was in Vancouver. The highlight of the day was dinner. I was in a class and a number of us went to dinner that night. There was a sexist/racist guy in our class, who acted like he wasn't either of those things. After a few stories from him that were filled with racist and sexist comments, we all attacked him for his comments - he dropped out of the class.

24 - I woke up in Barcelona on that day, and went to the beach very early. I climbed up a lifeguard tower and looked over the quiet Mediterranean. I called my parents that evening from a pay phone at the base of Las Ramblas, and talked to my mother (my dad wasn't home from work yet).

23 - I spent the day getting from Tikal to Antigua, Guatemala. I called home on a rainy night in Antigua and made my first of three international birthday calls to Towson.

18 - I actually don't remember my 18th birthday, just that it was the day before my high school graduation and so it was completely overshadowed.

13 - We lived in De Kalb when I turned 13, but happened to be in Towson on my 13th birthday, checking out the city we would be moving to. My family ate ice cream in the Kenilworth Mall. To this day, every time I go into the Kenilworth Mall, I remember that - I'm glad the ice cream store is still there.

You get an idea of how excited I am about birthdays

(I remember nothing of my 7th, not even that I had a party)

5 - I turned 5, five days after Emily was born. I remember feeling kind of jealous. I was going to have a special Superman cake (a blue cake with the Superman logo on it) that my mom and aunt had worked on. I still got the cake, but my mom was in the hospital still. There is this picture of me, wearing a Superman t-shirt, next to my cake. It's my favorite birthday picture.

3 - I don't remember my third birthday, but I remember it through pictures. It was one of the few birthday parties I've had. My mom made a cake that looked like a 3-car train, with cookies for wheels. There are these pictures of me with the cake, where I look like I don't quite know what's going on exactly.

Emily mentioned on her birthday that, every important day in her life these days, reminds her of our mother. I think that's why I just want my next birthday to pass, uneventfully. On my last birthday, I was so busy in transit that it never really struck me that it was my first birthday without my mother. I know that won't happen this year. I plan on calling Towson, as I've always done, but I probably will not be calling the house on Bosley Avenue this year, but my dad's office. And I won't hear that familiar Ghanaian accent wishing me a happy birthday, reminding me of birthdays past, and that cake that looked like a train.

please let the sun go down on me

Back in late October, I wrote a blog post about the limited sun we got in the sky back then. Now, in late April, we have quite the opposite. A couple of days ago, Lauren said to me ‘it’s light so late in the evenings’; it was 8:36 pm. I regularly hang clothes out to dry at ‘night’, even though it’s still light outside; after the hour-long washing cycle, after I took a shower, after I rode the ½ hour home from work, after I left work at 5:30 pm. You get the idea, I’m hanging clothes outside at 8 or 9 pm, to dry. I’m the odd guy in our building who hangs clothes outside overnight, but I know that, come 6 or 7 am, the sun will be out again, and the clothes will get dry while I’m at work.

Of course, there is the downside to the light. I’ve had problems sleeping for 20 years, since I was a teenager. I’ve had problems falling asleep, problems with waking up in the middle of the night, and the problem I have had over the last several weeks - waking up too early.

For most days over the last 3-4 weeks, I have woken up at about 5:30 am, after sleeping about 6-6½ hours. I can usually get by on 6 hours sleep for a few days in a row, but a few weeks is starting to take it’s toll on me. What is the cause of this lack of sleep? The light. I’ve never been able to sleep when it’s light outside. Even when I have experienced my worst jet-lag, I’m only able muster an hour, or so, during daylight hours.

So I wake up at 5:30, lay there for a while, and usually get up at 6, not sure what to do with myself - no papers to grade, no exam questions to write, no student emails to respond to. It’s during these early morning hours that I miss teaching the most.

I am able to get through the day without feeling particularly tired, although my body tells me that I am, with an eye twitch that lasts for days, or sore muscles that didn’t get enough rest. I get home and feel fine, but in an hour or two, I’m exhausted. I often feel like I could go to bed at 8 pm, but I don’t. I worry that if I go to bed at 8, I’ll wake up at 3, and who wants that, really? Instead, get through the evening in a tired stupor, going to bed at 11 or 11:30, and get my 6 ½ hours for the night. Sometimes I can’t fall asleep because I’m worried I won’t be able to sleep - lack of sleep caused by thinking about lack of sleep.

I’ve been told it will get to the point where it is light at 4:30, and dark at about 11:30. I’m sure many people like the idea of having 19 hours of daylight, I’m dreading it, much like I dreaded getting only 6 hours of light back in December. Oh, to live on the equator.

the worst performance ever?

it's interesting to see what words people search that lead them to my blog. if you search "put on track pants" "didn't have any", a blog post of mine is the first to come up. why someone would search those two quotes together, is beyond me.

in an effort to not offend people in my city, who are members of a certain non-conservative church, that starts with U, i'm going to be a little careful with my words here. i would hate for them to come across this blog post in a search.

a couple of months ago, i had this feeling i've had in times past, when i feel like i should do something to improve my spiritual life. i did what i've done in the past; i found a place to go on a sunday morning. i told lauren about this and we went to the U's church. as i have in the past, i didn't get out of it what i had hoped. i would kind of zone out during the sermon, not remembering anything about it, and didn't get much of the socializing i attempted to do with people afterwards. lauren seemed to get more out of it than i did.

a couple of weeks ago, the minister invited people to attend a dinner and movie viewing, that was scheduled for the next friday. sitting there, i got the impression that the movie was a documentary about a famous scottish poet, whose first name is robert and whose last name rhymes with 'ferns'. did i mention that i zone out during the service? it was presented at the fringe festival a few years ago, so it must be reasonably good, right?

we got to the U on friday evening, and the dinner wasn't bad, considering it was free. we ate, had awkward socializing moments - including being told we couldn't sit in some seats, because some people knew some people who 'might' want to leave early - didn't seem very welcoming.

after dinner, the movie started. very early on, i could see it was not a very professional movie - there was a shot of the building we were sitting in, a zoom in to a pigeon walking on a sidewalk, the quality was at about the level of my flip camera - i would've thought a fringe movie would have better quality, but i would give it a chance.

soon after the pigeon shot, i realized it was not a documentary, it was a recording of a play that was done at the U, about the famous poet. the next shot was the cast 'behind the scenes' as the show was about to start. this seemed unnecessary to me as a viewer, because they were not saying anything backstage that seemed all that relevant - this lasted for about 5 minutes.

then they started walking out of the room, into the main performance room, which was the main hall of the U. ok, i thought, but why is the camera just following them, hand-held style, but not in a good way.

the play started. i thought the camera would be placed in a position centered, so the viewer would get a good view of the stage. instead, it was at the far right or left of the first pew - the only fancy tech thing of the recording was switching from one horrible angle to another.

now, the actual performance. picture a bunch of 11 year olds doing a play, where lines are forgotten, scripts are read on stage by cast members, and you have an idea of the performance. add to it the poor sound quality of the recording, the bad camera work, and we have a winner - the worst performance i've ever seen. i've seen my sister do performances when she was 8, i've worked at summer camps where kids put on performances, i've seen 'showgirls', but this was, by far, the worst performance i've ever seen.

after sitting through this for about 1 1/2 hours, watching a number of people doze off, the minister of the U looking bored/shocked with how bad it was, the woman in front of me take off her glasses for long stretches of the film, i started reading the program. the group was an inclusive one - no one is turned away. if you don't turn anyone away from your performance group, can you really expect strangers to pay to watch you perform (there was a £6 charge when they performed during the festival)?

the play came to an end. a sense of relief came over me, thinking the dvd would stop; it didn't. we then were given the opportunity to hear the thank yous from the director, from the performance on the dvd. to top it off, at the point, the camera was pointing at the director's knees. the dvd continued, the thank yous continued, i leaned into lauren - "i think we should leave". we got up, walked out, being the first people to leave.

walking out, lauren said something that made me laugh on the inside. she wasn't in the best of moods, so i didn't. she said "i can't believe i missed 'american idol' for this" - i should mention, this was the 'american idol' results show, shown 20 hours after the results are out because UK t.v. shows 'american idol' the day after it airs in the US.

so, if missing a show that is not particularly great to begin with, that you can probably find online, showing results you can definitely find online, that happened nearly 24 hours before. if this is something you regret missing, the thing you are missing it for, probably sucks.

i'm not sure if we'll be going back to the U.

525,600 minutes

my mother and I, at my wedding reception

I really thought I would be further along in the grieving process by now, a year since my mother's death - however, I feel like I'm in the same place I was last April, a month after she died.

I attempt to put on a good face when I talk to to people in my life, but they don't see me in my times of sadness and frustration, wondering why I'm 'stuck'. I do that alone, feeling like they have all moved to a place I haven't yet.

I live in a constant state of sadness, anger, and guilt over what I should have done for the sake of my mother before she died and what I should have done for my sake, in the year since.

Several months after she passed away I decided to write about what I was going through around the time of her death. I thought this would help in the grieving process, but it didn't.

I'm hoping in this post, that sharing a small piece of what I wrote will do more for me than writing it did. Below is the story of one day, the day I went home to see my mother, for the last time.....

March 18, 2010

As I was waiting to get onto the bus, Lauren asked me what my mother's full name was; Lauren wanted to dedicate the Twi book she was working on to my mother. I teared up, as I had done a number of times in the previous few weeks, knowing that I would be going back to Towson on March 18; knowing that this would be the last time I was going home to see my mother.

I don't remember much about the bus ride to the airport, or boarding the plane, or what movies were playing on the flight, and what movies I may have watched. I do remember that the flight was delayed for an hour in Heathrow, because of some kind of technical problem.

Two things stick out for me on this flight. I had developed a fear of flying at some point in my 20's, but had no fear as I sat on the plane. I remember thinking that no amount of turbulence on this flight would even begin to compare to what my mother had been going through over the last few months. I remember thinking that I was so much luckier than so many people who, like my mother, were suffering in that moment as I buckled in to fly across the Atlantic.

The other thing I remember is the guy from Kenya I was seated next to. He had no bags with him, which worried me a little - who doesn't carry anything on a transatlantic flight. After we were in the air, he borrowed a pen from me, and we started talking. He showed me an old picture of him with dreadlocks, which he no longer had; he told me about his turbulent flight from Nairobi to London, and how he had lived in Baltimore for a few years, but wanted to move back to Kenya.

He seemed like a nice guy, and when he asked if he could get a ride into the city after we landed, I didn't think much of it, and said I would ask my sister after we landed. He used my phone once we were on the ground, and then we both went through customs. After we met up again, we both complained about the treatment we got from the customs officers at BWI - they took a bunch of spices he had hoped to bring from Kenya; I was asked "How did that happen?" to my being born in Nigeria - I considered going through an explanation of how it happens that children are born to the officer, but I was nervous about seeing my mother, knowing she was in bad shape.

I talked to my dad soon after landing. He seemed to want to talk about everything but my mother - the flight, the customs people, the delay we had in Heathrow. To this day, I don't know if he was doing this because he didn't feel comfortable talking about it, or if he was trying to shield me, for one last time, from the shape my mother was in. Part of me would have liked it if he would have been a little bit more graphic about her condition; a bigger part of me is glad he never did. I can't imagine what the experience was like for my father to go through that with my mother, and in the months since I have grown to admire my father more than anyone I know. We've always kind of teased my dad about his geekiness/nerdiness but, because of what he went through, I have come to see my father as the toughest man I know.

Emily picked me and the Kenyan guy up, and we dropped him off at a parking garage his cousin worked at. We then headed to Towson. Emily had not said anything about our mother until after we dropped him off. She tried to prepare me for what I would see, and said she was worried about me, because I hadn't seen the slow deteriation of our mother. She said she would rather be in her position than my own, because she had seen my mother on a daily basis, slowly get worse - I hadn't seen our mother in two months.

I now think of Emily much the same way I think of my dad. I wrote a blog once on how, even though she was the youngest of our clan, during the last months of my mother's life, you would've guessed she was older than her big brother and sister, who are 5 and 16 years older than her, respectively. I remember thinking on that drive back how much I admired my little sister, and how much braver and tougher she was than me. I don't think I could've handled taking care of my mother the way Emily did and for that, the rest of my family will be eternally grateful.

I got home, but I didn't want to go upstairs. I was scared to see my mother in the condition she was in. I talked briefly to my dad, but then had to go up there, to see my mother. I went upstairs, not sure what what to expect. It was not good; she was lying on the bed in an L shape on her side, mumbling incoherently, her eyes were somewhat glazed over, kind of staring into nowhere. She was tiny compared to the person she was last Summer, the last time I saw her completely healthy. She was lying in the bed, seemingly unable to move much.

Emily and my dad said "Jeff is here, Jeff is here". Her sister, Mary, who had arrived from New York that same day, said to her in Twi "Jeff is here, Jeff is here." My mother, in the midst of her mumbling, then said the last word I would ever here her say in English - she said "Jeff".

Many people have said to me over the months since she died "remember the good times you had with her", and I do, and remembering those times bring some level of comfort. But every single day, I see what I saw that night, sitting on the edge of my parents' bed, my mother, not the person she was, and we, unable to do anything about it. I hear her saying my name that last time. And every time I remember that night, I am filled with unbelievable sadness.

my mom and my niece, Maya - Summer 2009

It's hard for me to think it's been more than 525,600 minutes since my mother took her last breath. I still feel her around me all the time, hearing her voice in my head multiple times a day, when I'm doing something in the kitchen that's not the best idea, or when I'm feeling alone in the world. It's a nice feeling, but it's also a reminder that I won't hear her actual voice again, just her voice in my head - that feeling is not so nice.

In the past year, music has affected me more than it ever used to and I've been brought to tears every time I've heard this song. It makes me miss the nearly 34 seasons of love I had with my mother, but also makes me happy. When the soloist breaks out her powerful voice, I think of my mother. No one would call my mother a powerful gospel singer, not by any means, trust me. But she shared love, gave love, and spread love - she always wanted everyone around her to be happy; to be loved. If lives are measured in love, Alberta Ohenwah Shirley lived longer than anyone I know.

The Hearse

The man stood there on the sidewalk of the street, blowing his nose with a napkin from the restaurant he had just walked out of. "Woman's Work" by Kate Bush was playing, as it muffled out the street sound and the sniffling of his nose. Although there were a lot of cars driving by at high speeds, there was almost no one on the sidewalk, and he tried to get across the street when he saw someone coming his way, as to not make eye contact with the person.

On closer look, he was not just blowing his nose, he was crying, tears slowly coming down his cheek, him wiping them off of his face before they dropped to the ground. He didn't want to be asked if he was okay or to explain why he, a grown man, was standing there, crying on a street after just walking out of a restaurant. He made his way to the other side of the street before a man, talking on his phone, made it too close to him.

As he crossed the street and composed himself, Aimee Mann's “Wise Up” could be heard. As he was walking down the street he saw a Mercedes hearse drive by. He didn't remember the last time he saw a hearse, and thought it was odd that on this day, of all days, was the day he saw one. It had clear windows, so he could see the light brown coffin in it, yellow flowers on the top.

10 minutes earlier, I was sitting in that restaurant, eating an Egg McMuffin. I don't remember the last time I had an Egg McMuffin. Sarah McLachlan's "Do What You Have To Do" was playing in my ears.

I listen to that song every 21st of the month, as I sit in McDonald's, remembering my mother, doing what I have to do. The song always makes me cry, and it usually takes a song or two after it ends on my itunes genius, to recover. As I start to tear up in the restaurant, I get up and walk out, sometimes before I'm done eating, and I become that man, standing on the sidewalk of the street, blowing my nose with a napkin from McDonald's, missing my mother.

Hibs

A few months ago I was reading "Why England Lose?" a pop-economics/psychology book about the beautiful game.

One part of the book (I can't remember if it was an entire chapter or just part of one) focused on how people become fans of a specific team. There were a number of reasons - family, friends, community, following the crowd. The one that stuck with me is the person who becomes a fan of a team because that team is the first exposure they have to the sport, or the league, even if this happens after they are adults.

Before I moved to Edinburgh, I knew almost nothing about the Scottish Premier League. If you ask an average American soccer fan to name two teams in the SPL, and they'll probably say Rangers and Celtic. If you ask them to name three, I'll bet most can't. If you would have asked me last summer what European league Hibernian and Motherwell were in, I wouldn't have had the foggiest idea. I now know, as do you, that they are in the Scottish Premier League.

The SPL gets completely overshadowed by the English Premier League in the UK, and with good reason - the teams aren't particularly good. Other than Rangers or Celtic, I doubt any of the SPL teams could win more than 1 or 2 games out of 10, played against an average EPL team.

In moving to Edinburgh, one thing I wanted to do was support a local team. Rangers and Celtic were out, because they're both in Glasgow, the football hotbed of Scotland. With my lack of SPL knowledge, I wasn't even sure there was a team in Edinburgh that was in the SPL - turns out there are two. Hearts and Hibernian (or Hibs for short). I wasn't thrilled at the thought of supporting a team I had never heard of, and didn't really pursue becoming a fan before I got here.

On one of my early bike rides/getting lost episodes, in my first few weeks in Edinburgh, I ended up on the eastern end of town and saw that a lot of things were painted green - pubs, and other buildings in general. It wasn't the dark Michigan State green (which I bleed, by the way), but more of a lighter green. I learned on that day, that I was in Hibs country. I became one of those people who become a fan of a team because of 1st exposure. I was about a block from an SPL stadium for the first time, surrounded by the team's color, and I became a Hibs fan - sort of.

I don't know if it's because the team's color is green, reminding me of my beloved MSU, or if it was that first exposure, but I now care about Hibs. I'm as big a fan as one could be who has never been to game, never watched a game on TV, and doesn't know a single player on the team. I still care about Hibs, even though just about the only things I know about them is their team color, where their stadium is, and the fact that they stink this year. I cringe and think "damn you Hibs" every time I see they have lost another game, and fall lower and lower in the league table.

The thing is, if I had happened to be riding my bike on the west side of town that day, near the stadium of the "other team" in Edinburgh, I'd be excited. Hearts are in third place in the SPL right now, which is a big deal. In the 12 years of the SPL, Rangers or Celtic have won every single season, and only once did one of them not come in second. If your team is not from Glasgow, you're hoping for third place, where Hearts sits right now.

I can't bring myself to be a Hearts fan, and cringe just as much when I see them continuing to win games and I do when Hibs loses. I don't like watching Hearts climb up the league table, holding on, very comfortably, to third in the league.

Instead, I support lowly Hibs. I'm a Hibs fan; I've said it. We stink, we may get relegated, but dammit, we're Hibs!