Dancing

Good evening and long time no see. I'll offer you my excuse, but what's yours? Okay, it's my blog you say, alright, moving on then. I still haven't called all those Tommy Wards. But I have several good reasons:

1. Remember that 10 pager I said I had to write? It turned out to be 22 pages and still going. Even for a graduate writing student that's verbose.

2. Summer has not yet started and I'm a teacher--huffing and puffing toward that finish line. (Insert image of cheer leaders since I teach high school)

3. I have a life, okay! A girl's got to have some fun. My mom always says, "You can never have too much fun." See Mom, I do listen. As such, I'm looking forward to a summer full of dancing...my favorite way to sweat.

4. I've been working on getting published and that's time consuming. Which brings me to the image of Mia Michaels (not quite as dissonant as the image of Jane Fonda in my last post). I sent a "pitch" to Bitch magazine (like that rhythm and rhyme--don't ya) and it was accepted! Look for my small blurb about Mia's fabulous--or as some are now saying-- faboo feminist presence on So You think You can Dance. It comes out in December.

Okay--so the excuses--you might say are exhausting. Not to mention, entirely unrelated to this blog. Not so--I say. For this blog is merely an extension of my fragmented pursuits. I will dial down the list of Tommy Wards and when I do, I promise to share my findings with you.

When I'm writing I like to pretend I have this huge fan base that's reading--so I just want to say--I love you all!

A List of Tommy Wards

It's mother's day and my Sunday will be full of loving all the mothers in my life. Especially the one who brought me here to this earth, and bestowed upon me the endless material for my writing.

Ahem, let's get to the point: Right now I have a list of 20 Tommy Wards to call, the one I called previously was not my dad after all. The reason I haven't made my way through the list: time. And, well, fear. My life is a juggling act as it is: I have over 100 students to teach, mentor, and grade. I have a family at home. I have friends I try to hang with. I have Pilates class and morning miles and my 4 dogs to tend to. And then there's the mundane: cooking, cleaning, laundry. And the most dreaded of all: Going to the grocery store. Last, there's graduate school. I have a 10 pager due by the end of the month, not to mention some brilliant revisions to get at. How can I take the time to call all these Tommy Wards? And what kind of toll could it take on my emotional life--already fragile enough?

So here's to you, dear readers, I will make my way through the list and reveal the real Tommy Ward...in time.

Till then, this blog will be up and running, and I hope to reach a conclusion sooner rather than later. My next blog might be about feminism and the beauty industry. Can these two ideologies coexist? I know it's a far cry from finding my father, and I like it for that very reason alone.

Happy Mother's Day, A.E.

Typewriter

Good morning! Once Uncle Mike returns from Bermuda, I'm sure I'll have more to report. Mom did offer a gem this week. Over the phone, as I navigated traffic on State Road 200, she said, "I keep meaning to tell you more about that day we all went to lunch." For new readers, she's referring to the single time I met my father. My dad took us to New Haven for lunch because he had to pick up his typewriter from a repair shop. So Mom says, "He was a writer!"

It seems a little hokey. And could Mom be romanticizing a fuzzy memory for the sake of her daughter's blog? Well, it's possible...Sooner or later, we'll find out who this Tommy Ward character really is.