We Go With Him

Orality and Literacy and the Homeric Question

This is really more of a note to myself. In the midst of routine posting about disablity rights, IDEA, the aftermath of the Arab Spring protests, Charlie's and Jim's bike-capades and running reasonably fast for a 43-year-old mother down the street after our boy (not because, as some people think, he is running away, but because he has a beautiful bow-legged stride and Jim and are sending repeated requests to Special Olympics and Charlie is learning the joy of running as I did at his age) -- I think, after many years and abstracts for panel presentations that never became papers and lesson-planning about Latin declensions and Greek participles and grading papers and quizzes, that I have found a research focus. 

The Homeric Question and orality and literacy, informed by research about the communication and language of individuals with speech disabilities -- who are non- are minimally verbal -- who do not read (in our text-based society) -- and how music and metaphorical language and memory play a part.

I'm refining this focus and also starting to read the mountain of scholarship -- Milman Parry, Albert Lord, Greg Nagy, Adam Parry, Nietsche -- on this huge topic. 

The Riddle of the Sphinx, Charlie-style

Who swims in the morning at school,

rides bikes in the afternoon,

 

and runs in the evening?

Yes, it's Charlie.

(Who, despite his full share of exercise, is quite wide awake at 1am tonight and bursting with energy.)

 

Spring Break Day iv Date Lunch

Jim and I had lunch Thursday at a hamburger stand we used often to eat at with Charlie. For whatever reason -- noise, smells, his changing eating habits -- he says a definite 'no' now when we ask about going. But we still wanted the grilled cheese and chicken parm; a nice unhealthy lunch it was.

Charlie hadn't gone to sleep Wednesday night till 2am, if not later. After mid-70s and up temperatures, the weather turned cold and damp, so yellow jackets were in order for a bike ride and Charlie's green parka for an evening walk. I think he has been looking a bit wistful at not having to wear these this week, somewhat (perhaps) the way I miss wearing wool cardigans in the summer (though I do find ways to wear them -- air conditioning and all that -- and a sweater is not a parka).

Thursday would have been our last day in Greece had we gone, and it would have been spent in Athens, visiting the Acropolis, the wonderful new Acropolis museum, roaming around the streets a last time, and visiting with my friend Emma.

While there is no question that I miss going (I know I have mentioned it several times), I have to say, Charlie has been a content and often-smiling child not just this past week, but in the time before. He got up groggily but on time for the bus, had a fine day, waited very patiently while I changed the music on his iPad. Some stomach distress has not (so far) seemed overly to bother him. I've been reading about Homer, and reading Homer himself.

And that grilled cheese was really good.

Jersey Spring Break, day ii (with great memories)

 We would have been in Thessaloniki todayand I would have been visiting with Rozy and her family (hello!) and visiting Pella, the birthplace of Alexander the Great (pictured above), and Vergina, where you can see the tomb of his father, Philip of Macedon, in the most amazing museum.

No surprise that Charlie had a super and fast bike ride on Tuesday with temperatures in the mid-70 degrees fahrenheit. To my happy surprise, I wrote the majority of one my projects, a review of a manuscript.

Now for the next one.

1st Day of Spring Break mmxii in Jersey

 

For the past three years in a row, I've woken up in Delphi and looked at the ruins of the temple of Apollo, and of the temple of Athena Pronaos, and happily stared at the statue of the bronze charioteer. I can picture all of it -- it was worth it to do the dorky tourist thing and take a gazillion photos (I also am glad, starting with the second trip, I took lots more photos with my students in them, to remember them by.)

Each trip was great, though last year's visit to Delphi was tinged by a text from Jim the night before, that Charlie had gotten extremely upset on a trip to ride bikes at the beach and my mother had to go to the ER for stitches.

I miss seeing friends and being in Greece. I'm glad to be right here sitting at my desk in New Jersey sunlight, remembering, after seeing Charlie off on the bus, after a good weekend (despite grandparent angst) with lots of bike riding in weather that is becoming truly spring-like. I've got a manuscript to review as well as a reissued edition of Richmond Lattimore's Iliad translation and a fair pile of books about Greek poetry and literature and the Acropolis to read. I've memorized 21 lines of the Odyssey and one of the Iliad and repeat them in my mind throughout the day.

 

ἀλλ᾽ ὅτε δὴ ἔτος ἦλθε περιπλομένων ἐνιαυτῶν,

τῷ οἱ ἐπεκλώσαντο θεοὶ οἶκόνδε νέεσθαι

εἰς Ἰθάκην...

 

Very loose translation:

 

But when the year came as the seasons rolled round

in which the gods had said he should go home

to Ithaca...

 

While waiting for the σουπερ boy's bus

 

The above photo is a view somewhere on the eastern Peloponnese taken last March while I was in Greece with 9 students from my college. We are not going this year: Long story short, ran out of money -- sure you've never heard that as a reason for anything before. I think about the three trips I was lucky to take students on in 2009, 2010 and earlier this year with much fondness; I still can't believe we went on them.  Those trips have completely changed, energized, revolutionized my teaching. As much as I miss going -- most of all to see friends -- there is also a feeling of relief. While Charlie, supported by Jim and my parents, has coped admirably, I can do without causing us all a lot of anxiety and all the more so as I seem to mention anxiety, and allaying Charlie's, about every other post of late.

Monday afternoon right before he got on the school bus was tough and there was a coda at home that resulted in me having to do a bit of laundry after diet Coke flew. But the behavior storm was, carbonated beverage on some wall and rug aside, not nearly as messy as many we three have weathered. Charlie's Tuesday started with him happy in the front yard waiting for the bus with Jim and having such a good day at school that his teacher wrote a three-word note. It has continued to be unseasonably warm and wettish -- it is pouring right now -- and perhaps that was one reason Charlie, good day and all, did not sleep Saturday till past midnight.

He woke this Wednesday morning at 3 and took care of business if you know what I mean and then went right back to bed -- something we thought we'd have to teach him to do -- and was, despite not a lot of sleep, up and waiting for the bus at 7am. His teacher calls me around 2 - 3 pm if something has gone awry but no call yet today so I think things went all right.

Jim and I have been thinking about how Charlie's well-being is so very interwoven with the steady flow of things with three of us. I thought of this as I spent the morning in my very quiet office catching up -- that 'fall break' Charlie had at home went well but am I behind -- I engrossed myself in answering aging emails, sending off law school and grad school recommendations, explaining for the dozenth time to a student who wandered in that he could find the office hours for the business law professor in the hallway, and getting a text from Jim that he'd finished writing an evaluation for a colleague who is Greek.

Just say he's καλυτερος και σουπερ, I said. Jim said, I'll show him that later -- Jim hasn't yet learned the Greek alphabet! But he is always saying we have the bestest boy and a super one too.

And with our σουπερ boy making his way in the world, there'll be a Greece trip again some year. Σουπερ it will be.

Spring Break Starts with a Little (Really) Magic

If the first day of Charlie's Spring Break is any indication, it's going to be a break very much like the spring break I passed back in March when I traveled to Greece with 9 college students.

We went all over Greece in a Pepto-Bismol colored bus; saw lots of sites that I had seen before but you always see something different; got a fair amount of exercise from walking lots; ate plenty of really good Greek food; got minimal sleep (that is, I ended up keeping my students' hours as I wanted to make sure they all returned from their 'exploring' safely); had a genuine immersion in another country; encountered many feral dogs wandering the streets on their own.

On Monday, Charlie and I all drove all over a good-sized area of New Jersey in our less than shiny white car; saw many places we have seen many times before (his school, the town we used to live in, a certain 'scuzzy' (Jim's word) convenience store, a certain Mexican fast food place, the grocery store, numerous sites in our neighborhood when Charlie and I did another evening 5-miler) and a new one (our town's running track---Charlie only looked at it from the car; it is just day 1 of the break!); got a goodly amount of exercise (a bike ride after Jim came home plus that walk); ate some not quite so great chain store food (the place we call the 'St. Louis Bread Company' makes a very chewy brownie; Charlie just had some frosting); got minimal sleep (despite going to sleep around 1am Charlie was raring to go at 8am Monday---midnight seems to be his new average bedtime); had a geniuine immersion in above locales and each other's company.

While we encountered no feral dogs, I did espy our neighbor's dog trotting ownerless down our street as I stood on the porch watching Jim walk to the train.

Now that didn't seem right.

These neighbors live behind us and often go on walks with their two young children and Magic, the dog. And seeing Magic trotting along as happy as can be, on his own, I had a feeling that he hadn't exactly told his owners he was off for a trot downtown.

Magic responded immediately to my calling his name. I ushered him into our backyard and shut the gate; he immediately ran onto our deck and probably gave Charlie quite a startle, to see a four-legged creature staring at him through the glass door of his own kitchen.

Charlie assented to getting quickly into the car and we hurried round the corner. Fortunately, we caught our neighbor just as he was backing out his car: I don't think Charlie, or I, was quite prepared to host a guest-dog, in addition to our other Spring Break activities.

Though I do have to say, there was something positive about Charlie having a bit more of an interaction of the canine kind. Surprises can have their benefits.

Magic safely home, we got right back to our planned activities and took down two book shelves, raised a lot of (duly dusted up) dust, and stacked up towers of books in our dining room. And dragged (after Charlie opened the door, as requested) all the shelves out to the deck.

While Charlie was not happy at how many times I sneezed while dusting ('ex-cuse me!' he said, over and over, hands over ears), it was a good start to his break. Hoping the rest of it will be as memorable as my earlier spring break in Greece was!

(Though animal visitors being very rare in our house, I'm thinking our visit from Magic certainly made at least our Monday one for the record books.)

(And yes, the photo above was taken on Sunday at the beach. Amid everything, photo-taking didn't happen yesterday.)

The Company We Keep

We went down to the beach yesterday and Charlie and Jim had a splendid, sun-warmed, crosswind blowing, 18 mile bike ride.

It was our first trip back to the beach since, while I was sitting down to dinner with my students in Delphi, Jim texted me that, just before they had gotten to the beach, Charlie had gotten very upset at my mother. A very tough situation had followed, rendered all the worse by the fact that the four of them (my dad had been sitting in the front seat of the white car, my mother in the back with Charlie) were nowhere near our house. Things turned out all right-- Jim and I are, as you know, no strangers to extremely difficult moments that involve a flailing, now adult-size, child---but to say it was harrowing is the greatest of understatements. I did think I might have to head back home, which would have meant the end of the Greece trip for all of us. I was the only professor with my nine students, my colleague who was also to come having had to stay home as her grandmother had passed away the morning we departed.

Things turned out all right, the trip went on (and was exceedingly fabulous), Jim and Charlie and my parents made it through the week (though three-quarters of them have spent the pass week coughing and sick). My parents remain unflinchingly loving of Charlie, even when he has his very worst moments.

I have to say, it all made Jim and me wonder, what happens when there aren't people around who care so much for Charlie that, when something really difficult happens, they don't just write him off, up the psychiatric meds, and pronounce him only suited to live in an institutional setting?

I don't know the answer or if there is an answer. Obviously we and Charlie's teachers and therapists work everyday to teach him other ways to communicate everything from a stomach ache, an uncomfortable shirt, to severe distress. We seem to be doing a decent job with the day to day things; no small coup, considering Charlie's minimal verbal ability and apparently limited capacity for recalling words as he needs them. But when anyone is upset, fearful, tired, anxious, grouchy, it can be far harder to follow all those nice protocols you've been taught.

One thing I can say: That night in Delphi, as the students were helping themselves to big slices of bread and trying out the olive oil, I mentioned what had happened with Charlie. I also said that I was going to be very rude and spend the meal texting and staring at my cell phone.

The response was universally sympathetic, kindly, and concerned. The students asked about how my mother and Charlie were, and some did so for the rest of the trip. In my teaching, I have frequently mentioned Charlie and life with autism, but not so much with this group of students, who I started the trip not knowing as well as others on previous trips. On meeting a number of them last Tuesday, I was pleased to discover that the sense of camaraderie and (not that they would put it this way) fellowship they had grown to have after spending several days together traveling in a foreign country had remained.

It makes me feel hopeful, to think that there are more than a few out there who have such sympathy about Charlie. I like to think that no one can take care of him as well as Jim and I do and I have a hard time thinking that, should this indeed be the case, Charlie will flounder on finding himself reliant on others who don't do as we do. But I suspect I will have, albeit gradually, to let go of this fear, and teach Charlie to learn to be with others. Certainly it means a great deal to know that some others might be so kindly disposed towards him, even in the tough moments.

After we got back from the beach, Charlie and Jim rested a bit and then did another brisk bike ride. Despite all that exercise, Charlie did not go to sleep past 11. And, he didn't go to sleep in his bed, but stretched out on the big black couch, across the room from where Jim and I were sitting. I rather think, he wanted to share in whatever we were doing.

He is great company, is Charlie.

Post On Another Foster-Child of Silence and Slow Time

Friday was our last day in Athens, usually a day when I've written a sort of summing-up post about the trip and how Charlie fared. 

Indeed we were busy as we've been on this trip: 8am on the bus to be present at the 8.30am opening of the archaeological museum in Athens, Athenian agora (marketplace/city square), Acropolis, acropolis museum, souvenir shopping in the Plaka. As you may imagine, my students were rather on the tired side by the afternoon (also keeping in mind that, from a students' perspective on this sort of trip, 'activities' of various sorts continue into the night).

I had no problem walking around Athens and up the steep side of the Acropolis even on very minimal sleep, the result of computer trouble and one student's unfortunate discovery of a few too many insects in her hotel room. I matched my pace to that of our tour guide, Emilios, and we brought up the rear behind the students (themselves a bit dragging): I am quite spry (thanks to all those walks and sprints after Charlie), but certainly young no more.

Nightlife and 'hopping' about for potable items were never my sort of thing: I was the sort of college student---a Classics major--- who revelled in the quiet stillness of shelves of library books to clubs etc.. Preferring the safe, I never entertained the possibility of studying aboard in Italy or Greece. As Emilios led us through the museum of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens on Friday morning, I felt a little wistful, thinking that I once might have applied to study here and been like those serious young woman walking with a sort of air of familiarity around the ruins.

Emilios led us among the display cases to one in particular, where we saw this fascinating ceramic piece that has quite a bit more to tell than ye average Grecian urn.

Hint: Think Fisher-Price's baby product line. 

If you're stumped, the answer is here---it's an object I, as  a college student, would have cast just a glance or two upon, before hurrying over to the black figure pottery. But motherhood does something to a person. Knowing that another mother---a mother centuries upon centuries ago---did what she could to train her young child in the necessities of life: It's something I find reassuring; something that really gives me that feeling of having commadres (like my friend Emma, whom I shared a lovely conversation with in the hotel lobby on Friday evening) and connected all through experience and time.

At one moment yesterday evening as Emma and I were talking (at some points, about various escapades of our 20s), my students--we had heard them on the second floor by their hotel rooms and I think I heard someone say 'Dr. Chew's down there....'---came down the stairs single file and went out the front door for 'adventuring.'

I was very glad to be sitting at a table with an eye on my cell phone, lest Jim text about some concern.

I'm hoping I'll be sitting in the same place a year from now, talking once more to friends and mothers.

Motherly Love, ca. the 5th century BCE and the 21st century CE

The internet in my hotel room here in Athens suddenly stopped working this evening, right as I was updating my phone and starting to write this. So I had a frozen phone and a non-online computer which is should not be the stuff of crisis, except that, being across the better part of a continent and an ocean from my boy, being connected is a sine qua non.

The man at the front desk was incredibly helpful (and patient) and I was soon back online (took a bit longer to get my phone working again). The little flutter of 'oh no' did remind me that one reason it's been possible for me to go these past three years to Greece is, in a word, technology. 

When I first went in 2009, I used email when there was internet. Not all the hotels we stayed at had this and I'm not one for internet cafés. Plus I prefered to stay in the hotel and keep track of my students. I called Jim, too, though calling isn't that convenient for spur-of-the-moment questions and occasional worries---and these, I realized, were really the reason Jim and I needed to be in touch. 

In 2010, more hotels (but not all) had some sort of internet access. Plus, Jim and I had found texting a most convenient and efficient way to communicate. When Jim asked me how to deal with a moment of Charlie being 'out of sorts' with his stomach and I was able to respond quick as can be while standing amid a display of neolithic artifacts at the archaeological museum of Thessaloniki, I said to myself, texting is the way to go.

This year, text text text; some email, a good dose of Google chat if Jim and I find each other online at the same time. It's been quite effective so I gave myself a bye for worrying when I found myself laptop- and phone-less. Indeed, I reminded myself, I never would even have thought of attempting these trips without my 'devices.'

The stele above in the archaeological museum of Dion (near Mt. Olympus, in the northern part of Greece) depicts a mother holding a little boy. A stele being a stone grave marker, it's likely it was made for the grave of a child who died. I was very struck by the sorrow and tenderness in the mother's figure as she embraced her son. The little boy is shown feeding his pet rooster a bit of food for the last time ever: Between the way the mother is shown to hold him, and the inclusion of the rooster, I got a sense of how much the boy's parents were missing him when they had this stele made, and how much they loved him. Perhaps they had the rooster carved into the stele, so the little boy would have it with him, wherever he might be.

It is something that such feelings are communicated via a carved piece of stone to us today.

Truly, some things never, ever change.