Today I’ve spent most of the day in bed with a full-blown sinus infection. I haven’t been able to  read or think or write. But my medication must be working, because I feel a bit better at the moment. Well enough to attempt a Slice. For help, I turned to Listography: Your Life in Lists. Created by Lisa Nola, this book “is designed to help you create your autobiography through list making.” This book contains over sixty different possible lists, with everything from “Places You’ve Lived” to “Favorite Records” and “Your Life’s To Do List.” I choose “Famous People You’ve Encountered.” I didn’t include all the rock-star educators and authors I’ve met at readings and conferences because, as thrilling as it is to meet my heroes in real life, those encounters aren’t really random.

Martin Sheen—I grew up (and still live) in a very small town in northwestern Connecticut. Our neighbors were mostly farmers, with a variety of business owners and professionals mixed in. But there were also many weekenders; people up from New York City enjoying the countryside. Each year, the firemen in our town hold a country fair to raise money. A parade filled with firemen and trucks from neighboring towns kicks off the weekend. When I was 13 or so, my friends and I were walking along the parade route when we noticed Martin Sheen standing at the edge of the crowd. We boldly walked right up to him and asked him for his autograph, which he gave to us. I don’t remember him actually saying much. This was in the early 70s, and he was in his brooding bad-boy phase. He was so handsome. He looked like he’d just walked off the set of Badlands. I can’t imagine he came to Bridgewater for our fair, but he might have been visiting any one of the movie stars who live in my neck of the woods.

Mia Farrow—She has lived in town for as long as I can remember. She keeps a low profile, but also is out and about like everyone else. I’ve run into her at the local store and the post office. She’s always friendly and says hello.

Caroline Kennedy—One year during Christmas break, my sister and I went to New York for a “girls day.” Our first stop was the Metropolitan Museum of Art. There was most likely a special exhibit we wanted to see, but I don’t remember what it was. After we left the museum, we were walking down Fifth Avenue debating about getting a cab when we noticed a family leaving the park after a sledding adventure. One of the children was crying hysterically about going home; she wanted to keep sledding. I smiled sympathetically at the girl’s mother, who was calmly explaining why it was time to go. My sister, afraid I would embarrass her, pulled my arm and hissed at me to “just keep walking.” I was surprised at her vehemence. The wind was whipping in our faces and I had no intention of stopping. It was only when the woman looked up and smiled back at me that I realized who she was. I was comforted to know that Caroline Kennedy’s kids gave her just as much of a hard time as my own.

Dustin Hoffman owns a home in a neighboring town and for years I longed to bump into him. Lately though, I’ve heard that Daniel Day-Lewis loves a certain restaurant nearby. Is it a coincidence I always want to go there for dinner? I don’t think so.

Thank you to Stacey, Betsy, Beth, Kathleen, Deb, Melanie, Lisa and Lanny for creating this community and providing this space for teachers and others to share their stories every day in March and on Tuesdays throughout the year. Be sure to visit Two Writing Teachers to read more Slice of Life posts.

I am officially stuck. I spent a good chunk of time this morning trying to process my notes from yesterday’s Saturday Reunion at TCRWP. I had an idea about how I could demonstrate a suggestion from one of the staff developers using Margaret’s innovation theme for DigiLit Sunday, but I ended up with a tangled mess that needs more work.

My cold has gotten worse, which may be part of the reason I couldn’t get my other idea to come together. I did get some rest this afternoon, but then had some family obligations that had to be addressed.

Those tasks have been crossed off my to-do list and here I am. It’s 9:39 and I have no slice. I have ideas. I always have ideas. It’s just getting them to work that’s the problem. So I turned to Naming the World and Other Exercises for the Creative Writer, edited by Bret Anthony Johnston, which I wrote about here. As I knew I would, I’m resorting to a prompt from this book’s last chapter, “Daily Warm-Ups.” It contains lists with titles like “Spend five minutes describing…” or “Spend five minutes listing…”

The first item in the “five minutes describing” list is “A strange experience in a car.” At first I thought, “Keep reading.” But then I remembered an afternoon drive home from a doctor’s appointment many years ago that had a surreal moment to it.

I was living in Orono, Maine, home to the University of Maine where I was a student. Orono is a small town with a huge university. The downtown consists (or it did almost 40 years ago) of a main street a few shops and Pat’s Pizza. For everything else, we headed to Bangor. 

The highway was the quickest way to get to Bangor, and this is the way I went if I was going to the mall. But on this day, I’d been to the hospital for some tests. The hospital was (is) on Rt. 2 , right by the river. It was a beautiful spring day, so I decided to take the scenic route home.

I hadn’t driven this way very often, and I was still quite an inexperienced driver. I don’t remember if I even realized the train tracks ran parallel to the road, between it and the river. As I rounded a curve, a train came into view, heading south. For a moment, it seemed like the train was headed straight toward me. “That train has gone off the tracks,” I thought as panic rose in me. “I’m directly in the path of an oncoming freight train!” Pressing my foot on the gas pedal, I tried to speed away. At that moment, the road veered away from the river, and the tracks curved back toward the river.

Of course the train wasn’t off the tracks at all, it was just an illusion caused by the bend in the road and the track. But in the split second before we both steered in opposite directions, I was sure I was going to be crushed by that train. “What an idiot,” I admonished myself.

I’m sure I was too embarrassed to tell anyone about this when I arrived back in Orono. I’m not sure I ever told anyone about this experience.

Sometimes I worry that what I’m writing doesn’t have a bigger purpose or some aha moment. This feels like one of those pieces. But maybe its about perspective and that things aren’t always what they seem. Or maybe it’s about staying calm (I really wasn’t calm, though) in the face of something frightening. It could be about becoming more empathetic when students’ tell me they’re stuck. Or maybe it’s about spending five minutes writing about a strange experience in a car.

 Thank you to Stacey, Betsy, Beth, Kathleen, Deb, Melanie, Lisa and Lanny for creating this community and providing this space for teachers and others to share their stories every day in March and on Tuesdays throughout the year. Be sure to visit Two Writing Teachers to read more Slice of Life posts.