On a fence

So many of you have asked me about my feelings toward Underwear Guy. Well, I hope the title of this post helps to clarify it.

When we parted ways last on Tuesday, he said, "Call me the next time you are in San Francisco."

And I guess I fibbed. If he was truly the perfect gentleman, he would have walked me all the way home. Instead, we parted ways at the last entrance to BART on the way home for me. Might be why I offered a cheek for the kiss instead of my lips.

My friends at work who are around my age question my exclusion of men my age or older as far as dating is concerned. These are women who still dream of having the happy marriage with kids. I tried to tell them that my doctor had helped solve part of this problem years ago. I still remember being about 30 or 31 and my gynecolygist proclaiming that I was "hormonally fragile." She then went on to explain that the only way that I would have children completely naturally would be by age 35. At 40, I have done the math. Even if by some miracle (Because in vitro? Way too expensive for words.), I actually give birth to a child in the next year or later, I will be heading into my 60s when this child heads to college. I don't think so. I am too selfish to allow this. By my 60s, I want to be in a posision to be truly enjoying life. This means the children have finished college and have started their careers. My mother's solution to this is that I adopt.

So one of the things that Underwear Guy has in his favor is his desire to not have children of his own. We had a whole conversation about his love of other people's children. Apparently he now has a namesake who is showing signs of becoming a rampant Republican -- a regular Alex P. Keeton. Fortunately he sees this as a slap in the face. Underwear Guy even agreed to speak to my kids about his job.

Hmm. That last sentence seemed like a total non-sequitar to me. But I'm going to ignore that. Instead I'm going to try to put down in words all the things swimmming around in my head since my class on Saturday morning.

My class was part of a part of "Teaching American History." My old landlord in SF would ask whose history are you teaching. And this would answer many of the questions in my family. One of the teachers present asked how to deal with the lack of information on certain groups in history texts. Did this make a difference in where the student was from? The facillitator told her that a lot depended on the child's teacher. At the break, I told her that it also depended on the child's parents. My parents? They regularly supplameneted my history lessons with oral histories from our family as well as books from Marcus Books.

Eck! I've just realized that I have strayed from the post title. Or have I? My favorite Southern author has always been Faulkner. On Saturday we were asked to read a number of quotes and to write a response to one that reverberated for us personally. Me? I chose Faulkner. Over Martin Luther King. Over Albert Einstein. Over Frederick Douglass.

"The past is not dead; it's not even past."

Bottom line? I have all these wonderful ideas for my classroom but still have not made up my mind about Underwear Guy. My coworker Queenie (I finally remembered the name I was going to give her.) and I are going out in SF tomorrow night since we don't have to work on Wednesday. She says that I should call him. I don't know though. What if there's someone even more interesting in the place?