At the Beach

This is it! My beach...Lake Michigan. The photo at left is one of my favorites of Birchwood Beach, where I grew up and now am very lucky to own property. Sand, sky, dune grass, blue water! No, you cannot see across it. This place is as close to Narnia as anyone can get in this lifetime. People who've been here understand why I make the 11-hour drive from Bristol whenever I have a few days off from classes at King College.

My house, called Stollaway, was built in 1941 and had extensive renovations and an addition in 2006-2007. I live five minutes by foot from the beach on a cool ravine. The creek you see in the picture above flows through the ravine and into the lake. The picture at leftt gives you a sense of the house and shows you the trees that dwarf it, towering four times the height of the roof's peak. My workspace looks into the ravine behind the house. The trees are virgin timber--enormous tulip poplars, maples, beeches, and oaks. I see deer, coons, ground hogs, squirrels, and sometimes a fox.

I've been working diligently for the last three days to get ENGL 2162 back into shape for our American experience together that begins officially on May 31. Re-working the Blackboard site is a tedious endeavor...so many dates to change!

The course syllabus and all documents for Module One are revised and ready now. You could actually start reading and doing your four required activities any time. Once class begins it's a lot like The Great American Scream Machine at Six Flags--no getting off, no time to wish for something else--just an intense and very rewarding experience.

My biggest hopes for you are that you will have fun with the readings and that you will let them take you to "places" you haven't been before--the ante-bellum South, the dangerous  American West, a circus train, Michigan's Upper Peninsula,  black women's American lives, a coal camp, a synagogue. I hope you will be open to these unfamiliar places and let the people you find talk to you about what they know. I want you to expand your cognitive space to a broader American experience.

This blog is the things I would say to you if we were having class f2f. It will let you know what I'm thinking and also help you navigate the documents and screens of our Blackboard interface. I hope you'll read it and comment.