Gregory, Destroyer of Worlds

Last night, I dreamed that I joined a cult in Alaska. I had to make my own dresses, brew my own mead, and raise a billion isopods to sell as pets to people in the lower 48. All of this is nonsense, which I can trace back to several real-life things.

I haven’t written on here in a long time. The last post was in July, about my niece’s illness and recovery, and a significant conversation I had with my other niece. I saw them both last night (they’re doing great, super adorable), and I went to sleep wondering what I should write about in January. My mind wandered to The List, which included all sorts of hard goals…like sewing. I went to sleep feeling inadequate. That’s where the clothes-making came from.

The kids (my students) and I have read a lot of stories about Vikings and the Norse gods this year, and the Vikings sure loved mead. Those of you who don’t know, it’s fermented honey that becomes a very, very sweet alcohol. Because if you live in a super cold place and you worship a bunch of petulant children with super powers, the first thing you need to figure out is, how can you forget about that?

My husband and I spent last year raising a colony of isopods in a 24-inch terrarium. An isopod is a pill bug, although there are lots of isopods in the world and some are gigantic, ocean-dwelling aliens. The isopods are the third-grade class pets, and everybody comes to watch them swarm all over a slice of apple or a single carrot. The terrarium is called Podstantinople. It also includes a snail who sometimes emerges from beneath the leaf litter to slide his slimy body all over the glass. His name is Gregory, Destroyer of Worlds. A third-grader named him. My sister said, “Wow, your class is an experience. It’s like living in an epic poem!”

Now gaze upon a picture of an isopod and imagine a tank full of them…they’re cute, but I get it if you’re icked out.

Anyway, this is my way of saying Happy New Year, Grownups. Sure, there are more important things going on…for instance, we’re about to have a deep freeze here in Texas, and I’m getting ready for that with prayer and charging the power pack. The house is a mess and we still haven’t put away a couple of the Christmas presents, so they’re just sitting there giving us side-eyes. I’m canceling Netflix to save money, which means we have to watch and memorize all episodes of The Crown in the next four days. But I haven’t seen you guys in a long time, and some of you I NEVER see in person, so let this be the equivalent of me stopping by your office or texting you at 10:30 a.m., bursting in and saying, “Dude, let me tell you about the weird dream I had last night!” 

Have a good weekend, team.