In the past two months, I have either driven through and/or spent time in the following states (sometimes twice): Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Wisconsin, and Kansas. I'm sure I'm forgetting some place, but does it really matter?
My summer travels now ended, I've landed safely back in Massachusetts, and I've finally left the level in Hell known as Tekoa Mt Apartments. I've had my new apartment for almost three weeks now, and everyday I wake up with a sense of disbelief that I live in such a nice place. It's clean. It's safe. I haven't been accosted by deranged old people. I have nice neighbors. The laundry room is in my building. It's clean. There's an on-site office that's actually staffed by competent people six days a week. They even answer the phone. The property is actually maintained and cared for. It's clean. My place is air-conditioned. There hasn't been any middle-of-the-night drug busts on the property. Did I mention it's clean? And there are lots of places to walk the little brat with pointy feet and happy tail disease.
Anyway, I'm currently procrastinating working on my lesson plan for tomorrow evening's Intro to Theatre class. I'm enjoying teaching the summer course, but at the same time I have a strong desire to stay in my new apartment, unpack, sleep, snuggle with the brat, and decorate, maybe make curtains. Alas . . .
My other vice these past couple of weeks has been a series of books by Elizabeth Peters. NOT trashy romance novels this time, though there is a bit of romance in these books. Instead, I've found myself engrossed in a mystery series set in the 1880s (and actually going up through the early 1900s as the series progresses). The books are about this woman, my new hero, named Amelia Peabody. She's a budding archeologist with an interest in Egypt, she wears pants, she has a sturdy parasol, and she knows how to use it. In the first book, Crocodile on the Sandbank, she meets her soon-to-be husband, Radcliffe Emerson. As a point of contention and insult toward one another, they call each other by their surnames (Emerson and Peabody--and, for Amelia, this is an amusing insult: by calling her Peabody, Emerson is addressing her like he'd address one of his *male* colleagues, and in essence is mocking her interest in archeology while also saying she is no lady). Of course, they argue and sling insults at each other for the entire book. Of course they end up happily married. Of course, they solve a mystery involving the sudden appearance of a centuries old mummy coming back to life while excavating at the ruins of Amarna, capitol city of the heretic pharaoh, Ahnkenaten. It doesn't get better than this for a geek like me who's rabid over Egyptian art history, turn-of-the-century historical fiction, and self-sufficient women who know how to bash an attacker over the head.
I think I'd like to be Amelia Peabody when I grow up: parasol-wielding, crime-solving adventuress! But first, to my Intro lesson plan . . .
This week we are covering Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House. For those of you not up on the Father of Realism (and with a moniker like that, who would want to be up on the man's work, really?), this particular play (written around the turn-of-the-century) is about a woman who leaves her husband and children by the end of the play (unheard of and absolutely scandalous at this point in history). She discovers that she's been basically living with a stranger--her husband--and "playing house" for the past eight years. She has no identity outside of her husband (and before that outside of her father), and so she decides she has to leave to find herself. One of the more interesting side notes on this play is that feminists over the past century have latched onto it with a fervor Ibsen could never quite grasp. It's not a feminist play. It's, in his opinion, a realistic look at the society that produces a marriage like that of Nora's, as well as a woman like Nora, and a husband like Torvald. Indeed, Ibsen is very careful not to judge Nora or Torvald, but to simply present us with the facts. In my opinion, I can never quite decide if Nora is a feminist hero or a simpering heroine. I don't think I'll be coming to a decision before my class tomorrow night. Oh well.
