RantWoman, it's #IndependenceDay? Don't you have something pithy and opinionated to say about the occasion, the state of the country, all the wars and lawyering you could be watching on YouTube?
No! or rather HELL YES, just not here.
This year, Annual Session is coming up in Missoula and the world gets a timeline cleanse that dates back to a very young RantWoman. RantWoman and the RantParents spent the first year of RantWoman's life in Missoula while RantDad pursued a Masters' degree in music, as well as liberation from his life as music teacher in VERY small MT towns. Imagine a very young RantWoman wearing only a diaper and the plastic pants fashionable at her first Fourth of July. Family lore involves a lot of watermelon and RantMom blithely hosing the kid off after the feast. RantMom telling the story summoned vague memories of visual fog even though at the time RantWoman had no words for the issue.
Anyway. please listen to the songs below and welcome to the RantWoman time machine.
RantWoman, why this theme song for your sojourn to NPYM Annual session? Why? You're going on an airplane. The closest thing to a country road might be the car trip from the airport. The big hill with the M on it near campus is no comparison with the Blue Ridge mountains. Aren't you afraid of cultural appropriation?
Uhhh, sometimes when God or YouTube gives one a song, just don't argue.
Plus FrankZappa deantl floss tycoon, funky, quirky as it is just does not speak to RantWoman's condition.
B-b-but, what does "home" mean here anyway and WTF going there????
This year marks 20 years that RantWoman has been legally blind. The number of times RantWoman has been to Missoula for Annual Session in that time is a blur.
RantWoman is not sure whether Annual Session was in Missoula the year of the enormous post-surgery bruise all over one side of RantWoman's face,
Sample dialogue: "Did your boyfriend do that to you?" "No, my doctor got paid to do that."
RantWoman thinks Annual session might have been in Missoula a couple years later after RantWoman figured out that a white cane might be really appropriate. That was the year a long car-ride earned the gift of a Service Python. RantWoman is planning packing with TSA considerations in mind but has NO intention of explaining about a service python, and not only because Department of Transportation regulations say NOTHING about service pythons.
Slightly funky timeline:
August ?1961: a train ride where RantWoman delighted (?) all the other passengers by squalling for the entire 10-hour ride.
Somewhere 1961-1962: well baby visit. Congratilations. DNA lotto winner. Congenital cataracts.
fall 1962: RantDad lands a college teaching job and RantFamily moves to CO. a picture of RantWoman scampering out of a car while RantDad helps a very pregnant RantMom. Family is staying overnight at home of much admired elders.
October 1962: RantBrother arrives, just in time to distract RantMom from the Cuban Missile Crisis.
1963. RantWoman has surgery for congenital cataracts. RantWoman's first pair of glasses arrive by mail on Halloween
1965: Little sister is born. Rant Brother has his first surgery for Congenital cataracts.
1968? Student Union building opens. 3 RantChildren visit often to soak up AC and help put the first scuffs on new stairs.
1969? RantWoman and RantBrother both have surgeries to address scar tissue from the first surgery. Surgery meant no swimming. New glasses meant RantMom claims RantWoman read aloud every road sign on the way back to CO.
1969. Another Summer in Missoula. The Moon Landing. 4 adults, 5 kids. A tiny apartment with weird wet AC."One Small step for Man. One giant Leap for Mankind."
1974? Fourth place in the Montana State spelling bee. Problem word: raucous.
1978. MT All-State orchestra, featuring a work by a Czech composer commissioned on the occasion of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia after the 1968 Prague Spring. Very dissonant piece even before it was turned over to a high-school orchestra.
So, RantWoman, what are the through lines to today?
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