Well it’s official: To succeed in English classes at WSU, you must be a rabid feminist who believes even the slightest hints of racism or homophobia are worse than murder. Or, at least, you must be able to fake such sentiments. Which may include pretending to support delirious outrage at the fact that a frat guy showed up to a 1994 campus Halloween party in blackface. You know, there was a time when I would have not believed that anyone would seriously compare that kind of thoughtless faux pas to the holocaust.

Somehow in today’s class the subject of reservations came up. The teacher informed me that native Americans whose parents were from different tribes and whose grandparents were from different tribes (still with me?) cannot lay claim to land on reservations because of their “diluted” lineage. I asked her if people should really be entitled to things just because their ancestors were treated badly. She paused and glared. Then she nearly screamed at me, “I think five million deaths entitles them to a lot!” This is when I realized that expressing anything outside the party line might adversely affect my grade.

When I got home today I watched a little television and read a dozen chapters of Rant. There were numerous passages I really liked, like the bit about how prairie-dogs came to carry the plague and Sheriff Carlyle’s “love is a muscle” chestnut, but I found this excerpt (from pp. 61-62) especially adroit:

By first believing in Santa Claus, then the Easter Bunny, then the Tooth Fairy, Rant Casey was recognizing that those myths are more than pretty stories and traditions to delight children. Or to modify behavior. Each of those three traditions asks a child to believe in the impossible in exchange for a reward. These are stepped-up tests to build a child’s faith and imagination. The first test is to believe in a magical person, with toys as the reward. The second test is to trust in a magical animal, with candy as the reward. The last test is the most difficult, with the most abstract reward: To believe, trust in a flying fairy that will leave money.
From a man to an animal to a fairy.
From toys to candy to money. Thus, interestingly enough, transferring the magic of faith and trust from sparkling fairy-dom to clumsy, tarnished coins. From gossamer wings to nickels … dimes … and quarters.
In this way, a child is stepped up to greater feats if imagination and faith as he or she matures. Beginning with Santa in infancy, and ending with the Tooth Fairy as the child acquires adult teeth. Or, plainly put, beginning with all the possibility of childhood, and ending with an absolute trust in the national currency.

Last night I made chicken salad sandwiches for dinner. Cameo apples, red seedless grapes, focaccia bread. This picture isn’t very good, but I assure you they were delicious.

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