Gosh. Guys. I fell in this ridiculous loop of half-baked thoughts that went nowhere and then I worked myself into a frenzy of having nothing to say. Well. Here's what I've been thinking about.
For a few weeks now I've watched this ^ a whole bunch. They both seem like the coolest. And then I sit and marvel at the fact that we as humans can distinguish "sounds like." "Looks like." The craziest of all, "seems like." Isn't it crazy that we can take something we've never heard before, or seen before, and pinpoint its similarities to something we know? Her inflections are perfect. They obviously never sang this, but you KNOW it's that exact artist. You've never heard this song before, and maybe no one started singing it yet, but you KNOW it's the new one by Muse. You've never seen this painting, but look at the colors and style and subject, it has to be Toulouse-Lautrec. Or those Jerry's impersonation commercials. They're exactly what that person would say, and how he would say it, even though he has never talked about Jerry's Subs and Pizza! My goodness! Isn't that so crazy!
We watched the videos we made when we first moved in. Holy smokes.
Every door and window was always open just to air out the stench! I
never thought it would go away! But I think it has! I can't believe
how much we scrubbed, how all our stuff filled the living room for weeks
on end, how we didn't have Bellow. Sigh! Also, I seem to take
videotaping and narration way more seriously than Justin.
Every student who receives special education services does so through a
30-page legal document called an IEP, Individualized Education Plan.
Being in this business sometimes reminds you that everyone needs an IEP
somehow, a relationship IEP, for example. When you start framing
out-of-context situations around an IEP, you kind of start to think
about the other person's (or your!) present levels, where he or she is
right now. And as much as I hate that rhetoric, you do have to start
where that person is and move from there. Accommodations and
modifications. You adapt to what works best for that person. You
provide things you may not think need providing, but you do because the
other one benefits greatly. You go on to the service page, to explain
the overall details of being together: it can be more!, but at least an
hour three times a week, across content areas of home, outside, playing
with dog, etc. Goals, to remind everyone that you're part of this too,
you're working on yourself as well, with your partner's help. And then,
you know, whether you're going to summer school or not. But really. The potential for understanding and compassion when you picture a relationship IEP is, well, above grade level.
Holy smokes. In addition to the still-overwhelming schoolwork, the last twenty days have featured dancing! and ocean! and food! oh my! Richmond. Love. I took the advanced track for classes for the first time ever and I am like, so happy. Thennn I drove by myself to Ocean City for the MSEA Convention, which did not provide me with nearly as many post-its as I thought it would. It did, however, provide me with ocean views and docks, lonely hours, strategies which are at turns invigorating or saddeningly unrealistic, several apples, and an absolutely infuriating documentary where I walked out after the first 40 minutes. My time was better spent pacing the dock just outside the exhibit halls. Maybe if I feel like getting super angry some time, I'll write a real post just about this alone. THENNN I've been making food! We do this thing where our fridge is almost completely bare, and then we'll make lots of food AND have a dinner out and bring home leftovers AND have more ingredients for food in the works. Man. I made quinoa! With cranberries and cinnamon and apples and toasted walnuts! Who even am I! In fact, it was my SECOND TIME making quinoa! I repeat, WHO EVEN AM I. Another butternut squash and radish leaf soup is coming up, but this time I felt bad about the radishes, so I braised them (?!)! They were pretty good!
But. When I haven't been attempting to teach the children or dance or cook, I've been singing this song. I can't stop listening to this song. Not since Up have I heard such professions of love and friendship that ring so true in my heart. I want to live such that this song defines my life.
There's so much I want to point out about it, but I'll leave it at the two lines, "Appreciate every mix tape your friends make/you never know, we come and go like on the interstate." So sad! beautiful! true! People, guys. Connections. Good friends. I'm not even going to try to form sentences about how special and important these ideas are. Every six or eight months or so I get crazy into the idea that I have zero friends and no one but Justin would ever hang out with me. But then. But then! Some way or other I settle back into reality and find and cherish all my people again. This line epitomizes that simultaneous joy and sadness.
PS. Gosh. Embarrassingly enough, when I listen to a song, basically any top 40, a secret part of me listens, like, undercover to see if it has great examples of literary devices and imagines myself playing them to my awesome high school English classes and they think I'm the coolest and they TOTALLY get personification and simile AND metaphor and the difference between the two. Then I remember where and who I teach and more often than not, something else in the song nixes it for itself anyway. ANYWAY, this would totally be one of those songs.
PPS. Simile and metaphor is totally coming up in sixth grade. Oh snap.
Hey kids. If you like me, and you like attempts at photography, and you like people I like, then you MIGHT like our new blog, this kind of thing commutes. Get Jimmy to explain the title to you, but it's just us and hopefully other people (YOU if you want to be that other people!) trying to not be so bad at taking pictures, with the eventual dream of owning A Real Camera. Hooray!
Guys! Is it me, or is EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD CHANGING. All kinds of changes! Here are some things that I can't believe are changing, all at the same time.
WEBSITES. All my favorite places decided to update their look simultaneously*! The Google suite is lookin' fine (sorry Justin). Groupon adapted itself to be more visually appealing. I'm JUST NOW noticing Pandora's change (sorry P, I got hooked on ITunes' Genius mixes for a while! SORRY), which is gorgeous. Yes, the new newsfeed on FB is a tad excessive, but may I say I am totally psyched for Timeline. It's going to be clutch. Also mad props to PGCPS for finally hiring some sort of marketing/communication/PR/social media/website facelift team! You guys did an amazing job! Our new look is completely svelte and sexy without that incredibly goofy foam finger-esque KIDS ARE #1 or whatever. And good old Citibank! I know we've had our differences, but your website is finally leaving 1999 territory! Good for you!!!
MY JOB COMPARED TO PREVIOUS YEARS. Holy smokes. Every day when I leave school, I feel like I just got there. I spend my days coordinating meetings, having meetings, dealing with emergencies, fixing other people's mistakes, and every once in a while, making and fixing my own. I don't mind the work! I quite enjoy it! But I can't do that AND teach children. Days go by where I didn't go into a single classroom at all. When people say they need more hours in the day, I think they mean it a little differently than I do. I don't mind doing the (not-as-urgent) emails, logs, notes, and plans at home (for now); I need the working hours to be longer. I need children and staff in the building for more hours! I need everyone all together, available for longer. Sigh. It's like I'm the foreman, but I also have to do some of the construction myself alongside everyone else. Also, you know how all I want to do is manage the fun and success of students? And how I compulsively volunteer for things when no one else does? Put those together and imagine how much I want to volunteer to be the still-unfilled chairperson for awards ceremonies, or of something called character education! IMAGINE HOW MUCH. The answer is SO MUCH. But I am not letting myself! Because that would officially be biting off more than I can proverbially chew. And I am SO SAD. Next year, I reassure myself! Next year I'll have a handle and literally max out the emoluments I can get at one instructional leadership role and two clubs/committees. One fine day!
THE WEATHER. I think I'll start fasting now to make room for all the apple pies I'm going to make Justin make me.
CONFIDENCE. Gosh. I've gotten so much more confident in the last year or so, and it's accelerating again! I am officially not terrified of the Jam Cellar anymore! I am honing my 'management' skills to be pleasant, helpful, thorough, yet firm and maintain high expectations. I'm starting to buy more real clothes instead of convincing myself I should stick with that awkward polyester blouse that was a hand-me-down from a stranger via a 50-year-old former housemate. Not sure how I can verbalize how that ties in with confidence, but trust me, it does. Relatedly, one of my goals for this school year is to always feel like I look good. Isn't that odd? Shouldn't that be a given? Alas! I've left the house more often than I care to admit feeling really uncomfortable with what I was wearing, like a middle schooler trying hard to believe she looked okay and not completely stupid. And then I'd get to school and pass myself in a window or mirror and be like UGH WHY DID I WEAR THIS and it would make me mad all day long. Well, NO MORE
TASTE IN MUSIC. Fortunately, this isn't 'change' so much as 'expand' which is obviously still change but not one in place of another. I've started to love jazz outside of swing dancing! Here's a track I've had on repeat for so long, I finally broke and made a Pandora station out of it. Oh man.
And finally FINISHING TOUCHES. You'd think I'd be one of those people who made sure everything had an adorable, perfect finishing touch, right? Every little thing in place? Ironically, you'd be half wrong! For my insanely awesome school projects I did up to and including age 18: totally. For my wedding: yes, absolutely. In decorating the office at school: not so much! Crazy and unlike me, huh! I'm in the process of making sure that everything I do has details to match. The devil, they say, is in them. So like the clothes thing above (the devil is in the ... accessories?), or when it comes to home decor, etc. No more settling for 'good enough'! There is time and reason to make it shine.
So, here's to changes. Sometimes, the more things change, the more things... change.
*Weather.com JUST BARELY did not make the cut to be included in 'simultaneously.' But they still get a shout-out for joining the 21st century layout a few months ago! Nice work weather.com!
Those of you playing along at home will remember that last year I was determined to repair the broken glass on the greenhouse at school and thereby skyrocket our children into happiness and success. Those of you playing along at home will also remember that in a hundred different ways, my efforts were crushed. Well. Our students' test scores had been declining the last several years, and the powers that be switched our principal with another principal whose students' test scores had, in fact, been skyrocketing the last several years.
Let me list for you some of the things this new principal has independently declared we as a school are going to do.
Go to New York
Go to Canada
Be healthy
Have a garden in the courtyard
Have skating parties for students who score Advanced
Have rewards for kids who improve
Dress up and go to the Kennedy Center
Go to museums in DC
Stay overnight in Colonial Williamsburg
Have clubs
Have a weekly student-run broadcast news show
Can you even imagine my joy? I don't think you can.
