michaeljarmer

A Journal of the Plague Year: #2

Good news and bad news. Here’s the good news, in no particular order: the dogs got a walk two days in a row. I rode my bike two days in a row. I fixed the kitchen sink all by myself. It’s another beautiful day, weather-wise. Feels almost like BBQ season. The government is thinking aboutContinue reading “A Journal of the Plague Year: #2”

A Journal of the Plague Year: #1

We learned Thursday night, March 12, 2020, that spring break would be extended significantly. School is cancelled, the buildings are shuttered, by order of our state governor, for an extra week and some change. School business will not resume until April 1. Friday was our last day in session before this mandatory break. We wereContinue reading “A Journal of the Plague Year: #1”

The Dear Hunter: My New Prog Rock Obsession

It starts innocently enough, and slow, with the download (I think from emusic) of a six tune extended play called “All Is As All Should Be” by a band called The Dear Hunter. This happens maybe two years ago. Undeniably a great performance by extremely gifted musicians and a singer who is both super melodicContinue reading “The Dear Hunter: My New Prog Rock Obsession”

Thank You, Neil, Part 2: On Becoming a Rush Completist

I pinned down the year I stopped listening to Rush to 1983. Totally immersed in the New Wave and Punk movements of the day, listening to progressive music I found more avant-garde, like Zappa or Adrian Belew-era King Crimson, it was the year I graduated from high school, the year after the Signals record cameContinue reading “Thank You, Neil, Part 2: On Becoming a Rush Completist”

To Be a Life-Long Listener

In education we often bandy about one of our most sincere hopes for our students and aspirations for ourselves, to be life-long learners. I’m a huge fan of this concept. I never want to be complacent about my learning, about expanding the horizons of my brainiac: I want to read new things, write new things,Continue reading “To Be a Life-Long Listener”

Thank You, Neil

Somewhat unusually, I think, because it wasn’t a huge hit, the first album I heard from Rush was the debut, the only Rush record without a Neil Peart on the drums. My brother had it, and during those days, as young as I was, my brothers’ and my sister’s records just seemed to BE there.Continue reading “Thank You, Neil”

New Year Tradition? A New Way to Experience Music? 2020!

Section 1: A New Year Tradition? I hope this does not become a New Year’s Tradition, but two years in a row now, I have been ill going into New Year’s Eve and absolutely down for the count on the first day of the new year. Coupled with that has been a tradition that IContinue reading “New Year Tradition? A New Way to Experience Music? 2020!”

Stop the Block by Writing About the Block: A Resolution

As the song says, it’s been a long time since I rock and rolled. Actually, I’ve been doing a lot of literal rocking and rolling on the drums. I’m speaking figuratively about the kind of rock and roll that typically manifests itself in poetry, fiction, and right here on the blog site. Inexplicably (or not),Continue reading “Stop the Block by Writing About the Block: A Resolution”

Car Crash Haiku

As we were about to read Elizabeth Bishop’s “One Art” for the poem of the day, I was introducing my students to a poetic formal structure I was pretty sure none of them had ever heard of, the villanelle. To begin with, I explained to them that a formal structure was one in which theContinue reading “Car Crash Haiku”

#344: Who Let The Dogs Out?

They let themselves out, thank you very much. On a warm, August night, 11 pm, something outside catches their attention, and the larger of my two dogs simply stands up on her hind legs and, using the handle, opens the latched screen door. And they run. Together. Free to run and roam. They cross the busy streetContinue reading “#344: Who Let The Dogs Out?”