Happy Birthday to Charles Dickens. Here, I met class, lectured, and discussed frame analysis and emotional labor until the 10:00 break. Then we traveled via bus to the Imperial War Museum. To justify the outing, they are writing up how different exhibits “framed” any one of the subjects to evoke specific emotions.
It is a powerful set of documentaries from WWI, WWII, Vietnam, Afghanistan and the World Trade Center attacks. Of course, the little school children were intrigued by by the submarines, tanks, airplanes, torpedoes, etc. that are also there. I thought the museum did a wonderful job with narratives and photos from the Eastern European shtetls during the invasion of Poland. Most of my students were riveted by the Holocaust exhibit which had film footage and excellent historical documents. The Afghanistan exhibit blew me away—photos of British and Irish soldiers telling their stories with film footage running behind each one.
The 911 photos were from Hanger 17 at JFK. There were also pieces of the Twin Towers, but I was most moved by the photos of what was found in the rubble. There was one photograph of about 40+ pair of intact eyeglasses on display (ostensibly for family members to claim) as well as some scarves, shoes and men’s shirt that seemed like they just came off a coat hanger. It took my breath away. It put that horror in a new framework by focusing on the ordinary things that remained.
I have a ton of backlog administria to wrap up and some writing to finish tomorrow
Monday Feb 6th.
Good things. First, the good: out of the corner of my eye Monday morning I saw something moving across the backyard in the snow. Expecting it to be a squirrel or one of the cats, I glanced and, low and behold: a fox. I would not have believed my eyes but his pointed little face looked right through the dining window at me and held the gaze until he slinked off with that huge, fluffy tail across my vision right through a hole in the wall. I so wanted a photo. Perhaps he’ll be back. It would have been easy to miss except the white background gave him no cover. He was about the size of coyote but with much shorter legs. The salesman, at the bookstore, says there are many foxes on the Heath and they are not uncommon between the Heath and High Street. It was quite a sighting.
Bad: got nicked by a young boy speeding downhill on sidewalk on his Razor®. Took a tumble as did he into the icy snow drift—he hit a car, so I got off easier. At any rate, Have a goose egg bruise on right hip and a sore elbow and shoulder, so it was a lousy night’s sleep.
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