Freewrite

Sometimes, I stumble on here out of boredom. Sometimes I just feel a need to write about nothing particular. Tonight, for instance, I have nothing specific to say, but I feel a need to say something. I'm doing a freewrite, I suppose. I've done this exercise with students. The theory is that, if one writes for a full sixty seconds whatever is in his mind, without putting the pen down, something spectacular will arise up from the paper :) Is it happening yet? No? Well, I shall keep on writing then.

So, the past several days, I have been in my new classroom. What a feet that has been!! I've been unpacking boxes, moving furniture, dusting, hanging blinds, hanging curtains, hanging bulletin boards, hanging, hanging, hanging! Good grief! Maybe I'll get to planning a lesson soon! The truth is though, I love this part of the process. Setting up the classroom is truly the fun part of teaching. Don't get me wrong, teaching in and of itself is satisfying and energizing, but putting together the classroom is the mark we put on our school before we ever say a word to the students. It says "This is who I am! This is what is important to me!" Am I clean? Organized? Creative? Colorful? Environment is the key to a healthy class. I'm so thankful to be able to create mine.

Well look at this! I've found something to say. Something that I will look back on and read one day and say, "Yep, I remember that process. It was tough, but it was fun, and it was worth it." I feel like I say that about a lot of things in my life. And I guess that's a good thing.

A Time for Every Purpose...

Today I signed my life away. Well, my life as I know it anyway. Today, I resigned my position as a stay-at-home mom, and accepted one as a middle school teacher. Whew! That's scary! If I'm being honest, I am surprised by the complete joining of two seemingly opposite emotions of both excitement and dread. Not long ago, my four year old son, Tadan, asked,
"Mommy, remember you wanted to be a teacher and I didn't like that?"
"Why didn't you like it?" I asked inquisitively.
"Because if you are a teacher, you won't be my mommy, and I'll have to find a new mommy."
Gulp. The words punched me in the stomach and took my breath away. I knew what he meant and, let's be honest: no reassurance from me could change the fact that if I returned to classroom teaching, major change would come about.
His words now haunt me. I will change. He will change. Our family's lives and how we live them will change. Have I mentioned my disdain for change? Of course God, who knows the number of hairs on my head, knows this about me. He prepares me. He has even stirred excitement in the depths of my being for this part of myself, long forgotten, which I will be drawing from and slipping on like an old, silky, comfortable dress. A teacher is who one is, and not what one does so, in this respect, I have always been a teacher. I have not been paid to be in a classroom for seven years though. As uncertain as this whole process will be for myself and for my family, I welcome the adventure, and the way that it will add to who I am and who God is crafting me to be.

The Inlaw

Today I am the offended in-law. What does that little addendum of a term mean anyway: "in-law"? Only by law are we sisters? Daughters? Mothers? I will tell you that if my husband and I are one flesh (he is not my husband IN-LAW), then I feel like my in-laws are family. Not because the law says so, but because my heart does. I guess that is why I hurt as much as my husband when a family member (in-law or by blood), says something to tear us down rather than build us up. If a friend or acquaintance questions my integrity or that of my husband's, while hurtful, I recover with little wounding to speak of. Not so with family. There is something gut-wrenching and heart-mauling about a member of the family unit exacting judgement and condemnation of either myself or my husband (or, God forbid, my children!) Why does the term "family" give some a perceived license to dig from a sense of self righteousness, and bury the "misguided" victim with it until he is gasping for breath and breaking ground with no sense of rational means of warfare, only pure instinctive survival. I know that Jesus condemned the pharisees for flaunting their "holiness". Jesus did not teach people how to judge. He taught people how to love. If we can't begin with our family, be it through spirit, blood, or by law, how can we learn to love the world?

The Fruits of My Labor

Oh the gardening!! The planting, digging, shoveling, mulching, raking, weeding.....need I go on? Here's the thing: I am learning to love it! Truly! I get giddy in March in anticipation! Now, I must rewind a bit. If you are someone who has known me for any length of time, you know that I make no secret of my disdain for digging in the dirt. I do not particularly enjoy digging it out from under my fingernails. I do not like to look in the mirror and see smudges of soil across my forehead and chin. In fact, I am known for clean children who smell of baby wipes. When they were self-feeding toddlers, my children's little white onesies stayed white. Beautiful, glistening, white. Why, when I dislike dirt on my children, would I willingly put my own self in dirt's way? I'll tell you why: produce! Fresh, chemical-free produce. Beauty. Colorful, fragrant flowers. It's simple really, I enjoy the fruits of my labor. It all started when my older son, who was two at the time, decided he wanted to plant tomatoes like the dog Blue on Blues Clues. Well, the gardener inside of me took off from there. I can't stop! Do I still abhor shoveling and mulching? Yes! Do I still disdain sticky, smelly soil under my nails? Absolutely! The fact is though, that I have found gardening to be comparable to raising children. The sacrifice, hard labor, and sore sore back are forgotten each time I gaze on the seedling that has grown into a beautiful plant. The digging, much like potty training, yields results that allow certain freedoms and a sense of accomplishment. My soul, spirit, and body are fed as a result of simply dropping a tiny seed into a pile of manure. Yes, indeed, a gardener and a mother... they are one in the same.

From the Mouths of Babes...

"Mommy, have you ever wrote a book," asks my underwear- donned six-year-old Ryan.
"No honey, I have not written a book," I reply with mild amusement.
"Well, you should mommy."
What would I write about?," I ask, loving my son even more than I thought possible.
"Well, you could write fiction, or nonfiction....."

And so began a big long discussion about why mommy had never written a book. Let's just say that writing is an item on a rather short list of things I'm pretty good at, but could never make a living doing. Some days, I'm a writer; some days a cook, others, I'm a singer (though I haven't been that in a looonnngg time). On intensely interesting days, I might even be more than one of those things. I'm a woman, so technically I can do it all, right?
Anyway, my son's question has been echoing in my mind quite a bit since our treasured conversation. Why haven't I written a book? Not even a children's book. After all, I was an English major. You'd think that book-writing would be a natural progression. I mean, let's be serious. It does not take actual talent to write a book these days. Even Madonna was able to publish a book for children. I do not have to get published to say that I have written a book. I just need to write it. Soooo, getting back to my son's question. Why haven't I written a book? The truth (after making a long list of excuses to myself)? I simply do not have anything to write about. I do not have anything to say that other's are interesting in hearing. It's that simple. So, today I'm not a writer. Someday? Maybe. Maybe someday an original, interesting thought will pop into my head and I will say, "Aha!! Now that is worthy of print!" For now, I'm a blogger. And in about two minutes, I will be short-order cook (someone I am lucky enough to be at least five times a day :) The diversity of my personhood is too impressive to behold.

who am I?

who am I?