A hard rain's gonna fall

Oh man.  I gotta tell you, this has been a tough January.  Let me preface this by saying that I am fine, but I'm changed, and it wasn't an easy, voluntary change like "hey let's try Thai food".  It was a change that dragged me through.  I was not left unscathed.

How do we deal with all the hard rains that come from out of nowhere and drench us to the core?  It isn't like we can prevent these things from happening in the future.  I talked to my friend Kara about this last weekend, and she thought it might have something to do with God being in the mess with us, and His gentle reminder to us that we are not alone in the downpour.  She wrote about it so beautifully in her blog:

But a mark had been made on me about how a relational God often accomplishes mighty things. Not by lightning bolts and magic spells that zap our troubles into extinction or by giving us brand new unblemished situations, but by being with us in the midst of our troubles. Through this – or, rather, through Him – we find grace to lift our eyes off of our daunting messes and enjoy the friendship of our creator as he makes a way with us and for us. What a beautiful thing to see what will be knit with the strands he so caringly restores!

Maybe more epiphanies will come out of this tough time.  Maybe not.  But I know I needed a gentle reminder that He is near... and He has an umbrella.

Feeling a little grown-up

What does it mean to be a grown-up?  I've often asked this question as I look around the townhouse I bought almost three years ago, and I come to the same mind-jarring conclusion; I'm responsible for this shit.  Being a homeowner means getting calls that workmen accidentally broke your basement window and you may just have to fix that leaky toilet yourself (not hypothetical situations, btw).

Bottom-line, I absolutely love my home and I do like taking care of it.  People comment that it is full of my personality and warmth.  I agree.  There isn't much room for someone else's stuff... which is a whole other post I could get into later.  I like making coffee in the morning, opening the blinds and reading the paper.  Last week, however, I was bemoaning my sad sofa a bit.  I've had three sofas in the last fifteen years; a foam loveseat that weighed about ten pounds (college days); a curved, powder-blue loveseat that I got at a flea market for $25 (first on-my-own apartment), and a pull-out hand-me-down from relatives (somewhere for company to sleep).  It was that last one, the battered, cat-clawed, slipcovered sleeper that I kinda lamented.  It saw me through some good and bad times, and sometimes that stuff is hard to part with, but it's just part of the larger story.  Move along, little sofa, have a nice life in someone else's house.  The promise of a nicer, slightly used sofa set was too much to pass up.  And I got a lot of furniture for a bargain.

Do I qualify for adulthood now?  Maybe, but I still need to make room for someone else. :-)

Nevermind, November

I like to create titles for each month: Awful August, Snarky September, Obnoxious October.  These titles correspond to how I feel about public education. Don't get me wrong, I love teaching.  I love my students, (and I don't say that just because they stalk me and found this blog... hiya, 8th block!) they get me up in the morning, they soak up learning, they prank me, they teach me, and they make me laugh.  It's the extra crap I loathe.  

Senior Prankery last May

 I'm so disheartened when people don't support teachers, either financially or emotionally.  I'm disheartened when I bust my butt planning and grading and instructing and then 10 other tasks are added to my already full plate.  Let's just set the record straight, teachers work hard, and so do counselors, custodians, kitchen staff, paraprofessionals, and yes, even administrators.  But in that hard work, we seem disparate and defensive.  We seem to be working towards different goals.  We end up being REactive instead of PROactive.  We do this mostly because we are afraid.  I fear for my job, and I fear for the jobs of others who help me do my job.  I fear bigger class sizes and higher expectations.  Listen, if I have to teach 190 students, how do you expect me to grade papers, give them good feedback and make the learning valid and authentic.  I'm not a highly paid babysitter.  And the problem with policy and bureaucracy and mandates is that I'm treated like a babysitter, but also expected to raise standardized test scores at the same time.  Enough.

“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”  --Eleanor Roosevelt

My friend Matt was telling me about Stephen R. Covey last night.  I looked it up today because it stuck in my head last night.  The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People makes sense for education.  One of the habits, "put first things first" is especially poignant in this discussion.  If we spend our time in public education dealing with the policies we have in place instead of new policies we feel will work better, then I think we might be more productive, we might even spend money more efficiently.  True, there isn't a panacea for the problems of public education.  But the remedies are already here, they just aren't being used. 

We'll open a restaurant in Santa Fe...

I went away to Santa Fe for the weekend.  We took off Friday down I-25 in my amazing one-tank-wonder "The Shadow".  It has a sunroof, an iPod hookup and cruise control.  You pretty much just steer south and you're there in 5 hours 34 minutes.  You stop only for M&M's and to pee, and that better be the same stop. 

Autumn in Colorado is lovely.  But autumn in Santa Fe is heavenly.  It's all short-sleeved weather during the day, but at night it gets chilly and the coyotes howl.  There is definitely something about the high desert, it beckons and haunts you, but in a good way.  I've been to Santa Fe a handful of times, I have all kinds of favorite places, I get new ones every time, and people I like keep moving there... and getting second bedrooms. They are generous and I love them... a lot.

What didn't we do?  We laughed a lot.  We ate a lot.  I visited favorite spots and found some new ones, it was a good ol' time.  There's something about the combination of green chile, cheese and beans in a tortilla that just makes sense, but it only works in Santa Fe. 

Trust me, you're gonna want to go here.

 Then there was Trader Joe's, which feels so much like the cave of wonders.  Listen, pumpkin butter is the 8th wonder of the world.  It is amazing stirred into steel cut oatmeal.  I'm just saying, but I'm not sharing.  And autumn adobe kinda looks pumpkiny... way to let your Fall Freak Flag Fly, Santa Fe!

So what do I take away from this weekend getaway, I mean, besides the pumpkin butter?  I take away the peace of knowing that my cousin is well, that her husband is awesome, a new bunch of beads (Tesuque flea market...check it), a revived Chaco tan, and some renewed spicyness.  Hopefully that will carry me on to Thanksgiving.  Sometimes life is medium, but you gotta know that you can handle the hot.

Fall-orado rocky mountain high

Autumn in Colorado is the perfect antidote to bitterness, writer's block, malaise, and general yuck. 

 Right?  Can't you hear John Denver singing?  No?  Well skip to the next song on the player above... there you go...

 It was a lovely day up in Rocky Mountain National Park.  Fortunately, all the tourists were down in town at the Elk Festival wandering the main drag looking for the perfect caramel corn and waiting to hear an elk's mating call.  Boat missed?  Possibly. 

After a lunch of cheddar sandwiches and honeycrisp apples, we started off for a short wander through the woods on the boundary of RMNP.  Dad had been there before, (obviously... there are few places within 20 miles of Estes Park that my dad hasn't been... trust me) but we got to see the fall foliage at its finest.

Me and my dad

 I knew today was gonna be the day I celebrated fall.  I just knew that after this craptastic week, I needed a remedy.  I needed to drive up to Estes with my pumpkin latte and my iPod blasting and my sunroof fully open.  It worked. 

It worked really well.  Thank you, Colorado.