Summer Begins

June 21, 2006

We’ve got a hot day coming but less humidity, and I have NYU tonight.

I've been thinking about my political views lately-- I still am emotionally most responsive to the Wobblies (Joel gave me a great graphic novel history of them by his history teacher for my birthday) and the Port Huron Statement , but at the same time, after ten years, I am eager to see the Coalition move towards the stability of being a real nonprofit. And there really is a new generation with very little interest, unfortunately, in seeing themselves as part of the Working Class or even of fighting for Integration, if it's called Integration. Then there are the web-democracy issues that brother-in-law David Weinberger and others write about. Anyhow, I know what's right and wrong, but not exactly where I fit in.

I stayed up too late last night watching the Miami Heat win the NBA championship. I was rooting for them (after all, since they beat the Nets, one wants them to go all the way). Familiar Shaq, onetime Net Alonzo Mourning, Pat Riley who I still think of fondly in the back court with my homeboy Jerry West, and then there’s this All Star kid Dwayne Wade with the long eyelids and high eyebrows who looks just like the Williams family I knew in East Ghent, Norfolk. Well, anyhow, I stayed up late watching basketball and spent the last couple of days thinking more about teaching than writing, but want to advance my story some more today before I go on to NYU and Coalition issues.

6-13-06

It's feeling like real summer now, or almost-- hot in the afternoon, but today wasn't so hot that I couldn't sit on the back porch and do papers for tomorrow's advanced novel class. This evening, though, it's cooling fast, more like spring. We sleep well at this time of year.