The Big Cat Theory

There are many times when my son Dylan (now close to four months old) is cranky and will not be consoled by rocking, bouncing, or holding while I am sitting down with him (actually it happens with any adult, not just me).  He fusses and fusses unless I walk around the house with him.  If he does calm down while I’m standing and holding him, he starts to fuss soon after I sit down.  As you can imagine, this is rather tiring and frustrating.

The thing is, I remember Jonah showing similar behavior at a young age.  Jonah wasn’t as fussy as Dylan, but the trait of increased fussiness when I would sit down while holding him was there.

So I have this theory.  OK, it’s a bit far-fetched and rather silly, but it helps me not get as fed up with the little guy.  I call it the Big Cat Theory.

Some reflexes in infants are remnants from earlier in human evolution.  The grasp reflex may be left over from our primate ancestors–infants then needed to grab on tight to their mothers (or mothers’ fur).  I propose that the “fussing when the person holding him sits down” behavior Dylan shows is an evolutionary remnant as well.

Millions of years ago, our primate ancestors roamed the plains of Africa and were sometimes preyed upon by big cats (lions, leopards, etc.).  Stopping to rest for a few minutes had the potential to be deadly, as you never knew where a big cat could be waiting to pounce.  Obviously, infants who were docile and let their parents sit down with them fell prey (along with their parents) to the big cats.  Infants who fussed and kept their parents moving survived.  So Dylan’s fussing to keep me walking behavior is left over from avoiding being eaten by big cats millions of years ago.

That’s the Big Cat Theory.  I keep telling Dylan that there are no big cats in our house, but I don’t think he believes me.  Santina doesn’t think my theory holds water.  But even if it doesn’t, it still keeps my spirits up when Dylan is keeping me from sitting down.

Newer Dylan Pics

Jonah the chemist?

When my mother-in-law was visiting a few weeks ago I was called upon to explain the difference between saturated fats, unsaturated fats, and trans fats.  Being a chemistry professor, I borrowed Jonah’s easel, which has a dry erase board.  I proceeded to explain to my mother-in-law the differences in chemical structure between the various fats.  Of course I drew structures that looked something like this:

And I explained what the various letters and lines represented.

Later that day, Santina showed me a picture she had taken of Jonah drawing at his easel:

Wow.

My son, the junior chemist!

Dylan

Santina, Jonah, and I have a new addition to our family.  Dyaln Andrew Pitcher was born via c-section on March 23, 2009 at 7:20 PM (Pacific Time).  He weighed 6 lbs. and was 18.5 inches long at birth.  Baby and mommy are doing great.  Dylan spent some time in the NICU working on his breathing and being fed through an I.V., but he never needed additional oxygen and is now eating regularly.  Santina will be coming home tomorrow (Firday, 3/27) and we hope Dylan will be coming home then too.

Thank you to everyone who has sent us congratualtions.  I have posted some pictures below:

Woodworking update

Not too much to update, but I have finally posted pics of the box I made for my cousin Lydia for Christmas 2007 (the one I finished in August 2008).  They can be found in the woodworking pages here.

Upcoming woodworking projects: guitar stands for me and Jonah, a set of small shelves for the nursery, and a hope chest for Santina.

Ordinary World

I posted another poem on the poetry pages, Ordinary World.  It’s actually a poem that exists in two versions—the one you can find in the poetry pages and the original version.  Obviously the two are similar, but there are differences.

Why two versions?  I’ll tell the story of how I wrote the original version shortly, but the edited version was edited with the help of Greg Teran when I prepared my manuscript for entry in the 1994 MIT Writing Prizes.  With Greg’s help I trimmed a lot of excess from my poems.  In the end I won first prize for poetry manuscript (and $300).  Obviously the edited version of Ordinary World has something going for it.  Indeed, it is a leaner, more distilled version of the original.

I can’t find a written copy of the original version of Ordinary World.  I checked both our desktop and our laptop.  I checked my hard copies of my poetry.  Nothing.  The only form of the original version in my possession is an audio file of me reading the poem (in 1999).

So I attempted to reconstruct the original version.  The words are the same, but the line breaks aren’t.  In poetry, that can make all the difference.  At any rate, here it is.

Ordinary World

In an ordinary world
there are green trees
and rolling hills.
There are no complications.
Life is lived simply and happily.
No one finds the unexpected answers.

In an ordinary world,
poets do not
notice chemists.
For in an ordinary world poetry does not
exist. Nor do impressionist painters.
Miles Davis never played trumpet,
there is no jazz,
no one discovered the minor keys.
No free verse, no surrealism.
Green trees everywhere, but
Robert Frost never wrote about
the path among them.

In an ordinary world,
I would never take chances.

Fancy that,
you and I meeting
in an extraordinary world.

I wrote that poem (or something close to it) sixteen years ago.  It was Presidents’ Day weekend and Valentine’s Day as well.  I was 20 years old, a sophomore in college, with all the angst that went along with it.  I fretted over classes.  I fretted over women.  And then, Presidents’/Valentine’s weekend 1993, a poem came to me in a dream, like Kekulé’s structure of benzene.  I awoke and I wrote.  And I wrote.  And I wrote.  When I was done, I had the original version of Ordinary World.  Then I read it to my friend Heather as a sort of birthday present.

This poem remains special to me for how I wrote it and where I was in my life when I wrote it.  Other poems (parts of stories, even) have come to me in similar ways—I really did write Death in Maroon after hearing a news story on public radio after waking up from a nap.  Most of my poems are special to me in some way.  Maybe Ordinary World is more special than most.  Maybe because I remember how I wrote it.  Maybe because I remember the delicious confusion of being 20, in college, and how writing that poem was a moment of clarity for me.  Maybe…

Wood and How We Use It

I’ve updated my blog site with some pages about my woodworking projects.  I’ve been interested in woodworking for a long time—my dad had a workshop in one corner of the basement in our house in Big Flats (western-ish New York state, where I lived before moving to the idyllic hamlet of San Mateo, California).  I’ve always enjoyed watching shows like This Old House, New Yankee Workshop, and the Woodwright’s Shop.  I demonstrated myself to be handy carpentry-wise in the fraternity house.  And I finally got a sort-of shop of my own when we bought our house in North Andover, Massachusetts.

It was in North Andover that I built (along with a bunch of help from my wife and my dad) a set of built-in bookshelves for our living/family room.  It was the first time I used my router, and I really didn’t have much of an idea of what I was doing.  My plans were fine, I was just inexperienced in the use of the router.

That changed in March 2007 when I took a router basics class at Woodcraft in Dublin, CA (Santina got me the class as a birthday present).  In that class I saw the power and potential of the router unleashed.  My workshop sprang into existence in one half of our garage (in our current house in Castro Valley, CA).  I added a workbench, a stand for my router table, a plunge router with a 1/2″ collet (vs. the 1/4″ one in my old router), and a table saw.  And I began to do some woodworking.

I’ve only built a few pieces so far.  Obviously, I have a day job, a family, and a few other hobbies that keep me busy.  But I do enjoy woodworking.  I enjoy the act of creating something new from raw materials.  I enjoy the feel of the wood.  Power tools are cool too.

Probably the aspect of woodworking I enjoy most is seeing a project come togather.  I enjoy drawing up plans, but there is something special about seeing the plans turn into a real object.  Of course I make changes as I go along, but that is part of the fun.  And after all the work, being able to look at a well-made piece of woodwork is just plain satisfying.

Chairman

This semester I am taking over as Chairman of the Chabot College Curriculum Committee.  Friday I signed my first documents (a bunch of distance education proposals) as curriculum chair.

It’s kind of a weird feeling.  I don’t have tenure yet—I’m in my third year at Chabot and my tenure decision is next year.  Yet I am now the chair of what could well be the most important governance committee on campus.  It was an honor to be nominated to chair the curriculum committee and I am looking forward to serving.  It will be a lot of work, as I am finding out, but work that I am willing to take on.

I am continually amazed and impressed by the amount of collegiality I have found at Chabot.  I feel like my input and comments are valued by my colleagues.  I feel respected.  I feel like I am on equal footing with my colleagues.  This is in marked contrast to my previous institution, UMass Boston.  Although I did feel respected and valued by most of my colleagues at UMass, the overall environment was not as supportive as what I have found at Chabot.  Maybe it is the fact that UMass Boston is trying to be a research university and Chabot is “just” a community college.  Maybe it’s the fact that we don’t have academic ranks here at Chabot.  Maybe it’s the fact that I’m back in Califronia.

Whenever I met with the former provost at UMass I felt small, like I offered little of value to the institution as an assistant professor just starting out.  At Chabot, the Vice President of Academic Services (our equivalent of provost) treats me as a respected and valued member of the Chabot community.  The former chair of the Chemistry Department at UMass never made me feel welcome.  Here, there is no chair of the chemistry department—hell, as lecture coordinator I’m the closest thing to a chair of chemistry there is here!

And so I am now Chair of the Curriculum Committee.  And Chabot feels like home.  Wow.

Major Poetry Update

I’ve posted nine poems to the poetry page of this blog.  Enjoy!

Poetry Update

I added Walking Back to San Mateo and My Hill to Climb to the poetry section.