CARITA GARDINER

What to Read When You're Avoiding School Work

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“Why”…Wednesdays

86. Why Sports Aphorisms Work

Posted on August 26, 2020August 25, 2020 by caritagardiner

I took the photo above as a screen capture from a Google search for images of Jess Sims. She teaches strength (and probably lots of other) classes for Peloton, which has amazing online workouts. (You don’t need to buy the bike or the treadmill to get a monthly membership, which offers hundreds of great classes…

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85. Why Looks Matter

Posted on August 19, 2020August 18, 2020 by caritagardiner

The photo above is a screenshot from a joke video I made with my younger daughter. We both dressed and made ourselves up in an “old-lady look.” (If you read my post from last week, on my birthday, you’ll see that I’m actually delighted with my age. This post isn’t about that.) I know this…

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84. Why I’m Happy at 51!

Posted on August 12, 2020August 13, 2020 by caritagardiner

[Photo credit to Emma Brodie. Please remember that name so that you can buy her book when it comes out next summer.] This post will go live on my fifty-first birthday, making me three times as old as the older students I teach. (Eleventh graders are often seventeen.) Fifty-one used to sound old to me,…

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83. Why Keep Your Options Open When It Comes to Book Publishing (Guest Post)

Posted on August 5, 2020August 4, 2020 by caritagardiner

[Hi, Carita here. In the place of one of my traditional MFA classes, last summer I got to be an intern for a literary agent. No, I wasn’t getting anyone coffee or picking up dry cleaning. I was working on social media and online campaigns and learning about book submissions. My behind-the-scenes view into the…

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82. Why We Won’t Remember 2020 as the Worst Year Ever (I hope)

Posted on July 29, 2020July 28, 2020 by caritagardiner

“Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” Maya Angelou, whose photo above I took from www.readitforward.com), said this line, and I hope it’s going to become 2020’s mantra. I don’t want anybody to think that I’m loving on 2020. In the world, this year has left…

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81. Why I’m Thinking about “Like”

Posted on July 22, 2020July 22, 2020 by caritagardiner

I have a complicated history with the word like. As an English teacher, I’ve tried to help many students learn to avoid using it as a filler. I’ve had “like police” and “like jars” and “like competitions,” some of which have helped people notice when they say it, but none of which probably had any…

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80. Why (and How) to Keep Going (Guest Post by Rachael Herron)

Posted on July 15, 2020July 18, 2020 by caritagardiner

[I couldn’t be more thrilled to announce that you’re about to read my second guest post. This one came about because I was listening to one of my favorite writing podcasts, “How Do You Write” and heard Rachael Herron say something similar to what I had just written in one of my posts. I decided…

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79. Why “Wild”

Posted on July 8, 2020July 8, 2020 by caritagardiner

I was recently watching this YouTube clip of Dave Chappelle’s powerful monologue called 8:46. (I’ve linked it here, and maybe you’ll want to take the half hour to watch it before reading the rest of this post. That’s fine. I’ll wait here.) In his performance, it’s clear that he’s not shy about using profane language….

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78. Why Time Flies…and Doesn’t

Posted on July 1, 2020June 29, 2020 by caritagardiner

I took the screenshot above of this super cool episode of NPR’s “Short Wave” (linked here, so that you can listen and subscribe) on my second time hearing the show. The first time I heard it, I was out walking the dog, so I couldn’t focus completely. I wanted to hear it again, and I…

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77. Why We Shouldn’t Live in the Present

Posted on June 24, 2020June 23, 2020 by caritagardiner

I did a Google image search for “Live in the Present” and took the screen shot of the results, above. I have heard this admonition a lot in my life, but I think it’s a really bad idea. Right now, we’re in a weird moment in history. Some of us have a lot of time…

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WHAT I DO

I teach English to high schoolers at a boarding school in Connecticut. I read AP English Literature and Composition exams and serve as a teacher mentor for the University of Pennsylvania Teaching Fellows program. I’m working on earning a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing.

As a writer, I hope to capture the complexity and joy of life in the New England boarding school world. On this site, I share what I know about trying to write fiction while teaching English, coaching, and doing the other tasks associated with helping to raise over six hundred other people’s children.

WHAT I CAN DO FOR YOU

  • Teach                    Tutor
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  • Entertain             Enlighten

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Read my recent “Why I” Wednesday Blog Posts

  • 106. Why I Don’t Need to Hear Your Plans
  • 105. Why GSD
  • 104. Why I’m Done with Guilty Pleasures
  • 103. Why We Were Broke (for 45 minutes)
  • 102. Why Climb the Mountain
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