Friday Paradox and Surprise

Tonight I am going to tell you a story about a surprising thing that happened to me tonight.  But first, a necessary prologue.

I have recently been making a point to notice what I like about people I encounter in the world. 

Mostly this applies to the new ones, not people I've known for years.  And generally, it catches me by surprise and I like it.  I think it's either how you carry yourself or how the stranger next to you perceives you, but there is a good connection, and you are talking.  I find that I like how this shifts the weight and feel of my world.

Not, however, tonight.

Tonight I met someone who really creeped me out, for a few obvious reasons, and then for some that really seemed vague and indescribable.  I acknowledged the obvious and also paid attention to the other sense that said 'Welcome to Creepsville.'   And I think I'm writing about it so I can quit feeling kind of suffocated.  Or to get my skin to stop crawling.

I guess it starts with the semi-embarrasing admission that I went to go to 'Ice Age: Continental Drift' in theaters.  I saw the previews, thought the jokes were funny, and on a whim, decided to go.

Unthawed

            For a while now I have been talking about July being a time of respite from the world.  Breathing room for the deep cleaning that didn’t happen this spring when my world was everything middle school.  And now it is July and I am back at home, actually with no plans to go anywhere too far as I just learned yesterday that my car needs a major repair.   It is time to buckle down and clean.

            The car situation is disappointing, but whatever, it will get fixed and will work out somehow.  I work with fair car people, and that is always a great relief.  The owner of the shop used to be an engineer with NASA and really likes working with machines, so he explains things really well.  Every time.  But he doesn’t over explain himself….he expects you to have a brain and be following along.  Sometimes when I go to this place I find that I am very grateful for any experience I have with my extended family in Iowa. 

A New Look at an Old Word

Home.  The dear old place.  I have finally returned to Stillwater after two weeks of going wherever the wind took me.  It's very nice to live spontaneously.  I think I'm getting better at it.   But it is now nice to be home.

Here's a story in my life that hints of a lack of spontaneity (and a lot of inner tragedy too).   Five years ago I went to Glacier National Park in Montana, and I was offered a job on the spot at a little cafe overlooking the nicest place I've ever seen in my life.  They needed help, I was there, and I had half of my fellow travelers telling me to take the job, and the other half reminding me of home.  (And my stupid job at the bead store, counting beads all day and listening to Norah Jones and watering the plants because I wasn't good at helping artsy people find their next new inspiration). 

51 Kids and Washington, D.C.

Exceptional happened.


It is a week later (now posted a few weeks after THAT) and I am now in the beginning, again, of life post-D.C.. It is slow in coming to me, as I have forgotten a lot of things that didn't revolve around the trip.  All around me in the apartment is evidence that I have been busy. Nothing is in total shambles, but I have work to do in order to make my apartment seem like a hospitable place to be.   Currently, windows open, rainy weather here, it is a quiet summer shelter for a very tired me. 

'The third time is the charm' is technically true when I consider leading the trip.  I've been to D.C. 4 times in the last few years, but the first time, I got sick.  Really, altogether digustingly sick....I couldn't go to school for four days after the trip.  I had pink eye and maybe some bronchitis?  Certain elements of that trip are a little hazy, but really, the morning we woke up at 3:00 am to meet luggage and parents and kids at school, the pit in my stomach was gone.  

What a relief. 

Lull

Today two really wonderful things happened.  Maybe we could say three wonderful things.  Or maybe as I'm sitting down to write about it, I see the rest of a long line of wonderful stretching out in front of me. 

I finished all grades, all quarters, all year updates.  Finally.  I am done with it. 

Yesterday was such a huge mix of everything all at once...I think I was just partly there amidst the craziness of signing yearbooks and ending it with the crowd.  But today I sat in the quiet, quiet school, finally finishing those last small things at my trusty desk.  And it was the real closure I had been waiting for.

To mark this, I had a dance party in my classroom.  Probably some couldn't imagine me doing this, but I blasted music, and it felt appropriate and good and funny to be dancing like a maniac in the place where I have literally stood to teach all year.   Heather sent me an e-mail that said she imagined me running out of the school throwing paper and screaming, and I suppose this was my version of that kind of joy.

Done and Done

It was another one of those nights where I stayed super late and the custodians swept around me and I kept working.  The next thing, the next thing, the next thing.  I made myself eat, and not completely forget I had a body that needed some care, and I kept repeating things to myself about how the perk of teaching really is the long summer day in July where nothing is time sensitive. 

My good friend, Stacy the English Teacher, came in and helped me sort out of my tired brain when the things I had to organize for Friday just weren't making sense.  She could tell. We've gotten into a pattern of knowing when I need to do something concrete and the abstract side of my mind just won't stop getting in the way.  Yesterday she literally said, 'Is there anything I can do for you in a concrete way that would help you sort anything out?'  And I knew exactly what she was talking about.  And she knew that I knew that she knew.  (Thanks, friend.)

The Very Tired Teacher

T-minus....

4 more days of school
6 more days until the D.C. trip
10 days until my summer break begins


I've been very calm and unaltered about the end of school....something I've deliberately practiced in order to make it to the end and not flake out as a teacher. I HAVE to be diligent about their grades. But today is the last big push. If I can grade like an efficient maniac today, I feel like I'll be golden. I've been living like this....'every minute counts, but I'm still praying and still calm' for a long time, and it seems like I'll never stop living like this.