if that's all we can take

Wow, today sucked.

First, it's Wednesday which means staff meeting/collaborative planning at Norwood from 8:45-10:45am. I used to not have to attend this, which meant Wednesday was a sleep-in day (or get-to-the-gym-really-early day), but then some teacher was like "why aren't the student teachers coming to collaborative planning?" so now I have to go and all I do is sit for two hours in a freezing room while they argue about curriculum and API scores and my coffee gets cold and my stomach starts to grumble. Awesome.

So then I walk into my classroom and review my agenda and remember I have to give not one, not two, but three tests today. Three tests on material I know my kids don't know. This isn't my fault, mind you. It's material they should know but don't because they've been to lazy to learn it and today was accountability day. So after 45 hellish minutes of painful testing, I had to lecture my students about discipline and responsibility for their actions and how if they don't start giving 100% in my class, they aren't going to make it through high school, etc etc. It was not fun. And then I gave them like an hour of English homework and told them that if they ever tell their resource teachers that they don't have any English homework again, they'll be doing English homework until their hair turns gray.

Then I came home and started my period. Too much information, I'm sure, but it's just been that kind of day.

I watched last night's Veronica Mars, hit the gym, then headed over to UCC for band practice at 6. We didn't start practicing until 6:45 because the guys were screwing around with their guitars and couldn't get anything to work. This is why vocalists hate band practice. Alex is on his honeymoon, which meant everything was left up to the staff and then half the staff didn't show up. Fabulous.

But then we split into guys'/girls' discussion groups and the ladies talked about Esther and we had a really fabulous discussion about taking risks and crisis of faith and it just reminded me how incredible my life is and surely tomorrow will be better.

The End.

no sleep tonight

I'm sick again.

I went to school anyway because, you know, it's my job, and came to a really depressing conclusion about growing up...

See, when you're a kid and you go to school and you get sick, you go to the nurse and relax for a while and they call your mom and she comes to pick you up and take you home and you lay down on the couch for a while and she brings you medicine and doesn't let you do anything until you feel better.

When you're an adult and you go to school and you get sick, you suck it up and deal with it. That, or you decide that indeed you are too ill to stay, so you drive yourself home and lay on the couch and watch crappy daytime TV until you get thirsty or need more medicine or need to take your temperature, at which point you drag your sorry butt off the couch and get a glass of water or dig through your medicine cabinet fruitlessly for ten minutes, only to realize that your thermometer has disappeared in the move and you took the last of your DayQuil the last time you were sick.

These gastrointestinal pyrotechnics are getting old. I miss my mommy :(

along the watchtower

It turned fall this week. Then today it turned back into summer. It was foolish of me to think that the seasons would follow any sort of predictable pattern, considering the overall feel of my life lately. I need to take out the trash.

I have entered my final week of solitude. My roommate moves in next weekend and I'm... sad. I've enjoyed living by myself. I'm not obnoxious to live with - I don't play my music loud or have lots of people over or hog the TV or make messes. I tend to clean up other peoples' messes and remind my guests to be quiet and I never borrow things without asking. But... I would really just prefer to live alone and I find myself anxiously awaiting next fall, when I've been hired by a real school, am making a real salary, and can afford my own, lovely, one-bedroom apartment for no one but little me. At least for a little while.

The last six weeks have been overwhelming and difficult and hilarious and enlightening. I feel like I'm wasting my time in class some days and other days I walk away with such a profound sense of the enormous responsibility that they're placing in my hands that I can't even see straight. And, blessedly, we all get along. On Friday night, Brittany and her "partner-slash-fiancee" Matt had the whole cohort over for an international themed potluck at their precious little house in Sacramento and we sat in their backyard under twinkle lights until midnight drinking sangria and black cherry vodka tonics (I represented Russia) and eating Matt's incredible spring rolls and pad thai, commiserating and laughing and having, as Lisa put it, "our own real grad student party!". And it was great.

As far as the actual "school" part of school... My ELD class is a mess - no one knows what is going on, least of all myself. We've retained maybe five of our original students in the biggest class schedule shake-up of the century and haven't even ordered books. I don't know how, or what, I'm going to teach come January. Fransisco, who has been in the country the longest at nearly 5 years, can't even spell in his own language. As I reviewed his work this week, I noticed that quien was spelled with a K. The entire Spanish alphabet does'nt have a K in it. Lord, help me. My ninth grade advanced class is a little better... We at least have books and an established class roster. I get to teach Romeo & Juliet, etc etc...

In two weeks, I start my secondary placement at Norwood JHS in Sac. I'll be there all quarter with Jessica and Jenny and... well.... whatever. I'm excited, I guess. I'm just kind of rolling with the punches right now. Val and Pauline say that our schedules are about to get "really crazy", which is sort of frightening because what have our schedules been recently if not that?

I get the first third of my grant money tomorrow (almost $2,000!) and I'm trying to decide what to do with it. While the "I hate spending money" part of me wants to pay off the last of my credit card and then put the rest into savings and forget about it for a while, the "I like pretty, new things" part of me is itching for a new computer. Actually, I think my current computer is itching for me to get a new computer too. And, logically, it's a better idea to buy the new machine now with the grant money than to try to scrape up the money to do it once I get out of school. Ugh.

I. Hate. Money.

In far more exciting news, Grey's Anatomy season 3 premiers this Thursday! Daniel has been listening to The Fray nonstop for the past week and I'm ready to kill him. But Grey's! Grey's!!!

Oh! And my soccer team (The Chelsea Aquabats - don't ask) won our second game yesterday 6-3! They were so awesome and fun to watch and I looooove coaching!

(how's that for an update, friends?)

100 years to live

Are you tired of hearing that I'm overwhelmed? Yeah, well I'm tired of feeling overwhelmed.

Today, Jess and I met with Amy at HJHS to talk about some of the classes we'll be teaching and to get our bearings on campus. It's just.... so much. There is just so much to think about.

I had a minor breakdown yesterday (I've been feeling unnaturally emotionally fragile for the last 2 weeks, and I'm guessing grad school has something to do with it), when Amy called to tell me about her classes, all of which are super low-level ELD classes. I understand the value and necessity of ELD, especially in California, and I truly respect ELD teachers because, damn, that's hard work. But, but, but.... I'm not getting my EDL certification. I don't want to get my ELD certification. I'm getting my teaching credential so I can teach all of the things I've spent the last four years busting my ass to learn. Please don't put me in a classroom with kids who can't even count to 10 in Engish. That's not what I've been working towards.

And it just seems so unfair sometimes that Jessica and I are at HJHS and that Caitlin and Brittany are at Grant, while other people are at Cordova and Pioneer and West freaking Campus (a college prep public school!), for heaven's sake. Why do we have to worry about gangs and riots and pregnant girls in our classes, while they have to worry about.... whatever it is you worry about at schools that don't have gang or violence problems because they, literally, are on the "right side of the tracks"?

But I digress. I'm tired of talking about high schools. And I have to draw up lessons plans.

For ELD students.

through sick lullaby

Yesterday was not nearly as crazy as Monday, but things are still pretty intense. My room is a mess, I have a ton of reading to do, I need to start designing lesson plans, and I'm supposed to fit an AYSO coaching seminar in there somewhere. I want August/September to be done.

As if life weren't crazy enough on its own, I keep having dreams about Neal, which isn't as upsetting as it is just annoying. It occurs to me that, perhaps subconsciously, I'm still waiting for an apology or an explanation or anything that would make the last year feel less... something. I don't know if it's that my feelings are still hurt or if I just feel some sort of righteous indignation over the whole thing. Like, what did I do to deserve to be humiliated like that? Why did I feel like I had done something wrong when I came home, for trying to pick up the pieces and move on, and then I apologized? I apologized! Over and over again. For nothing. Nothing I did warranted an apology and I took it all on myself, like if I took enough blame for a decision that had nothing to do with me, I could make it better again. Like if I apologized for accepting an incredible job that took me across the country and exposed me to a faith I had never experienced before, I could make him change his mind.

Ridiculous. I took the blame for his mistake. I felt guilty for leaving, when it was his own weakness that couldn't handle my being gone. So why am I still upset about this?

I just want to hear, "I'm sorry".


It started out with a kiss
How did it end up like this?
It was only a kiss

say goodbye without ever leaving

Being moved in is nice. I have a few things left to do before my first class tomorrow like finish my homework, order my textbooks, and call my vice-principle to finalize my schedule.

That's right, I finally know where I'm teaching this year. Hiram Johnson High School takes up a whole city block on 14th Ave in Sac, has a pretty intense athletic program, and has completely integrated the e21 program, the most dramatic urban high school reform plan in the nation (I learned about it while I was working for Sarah). e21 is reforming Sac high schools in order to increase the number of students who are prepared for college and the world of work by placing all of its students and teachers in small learning communities (HJHS has nine, ranging from an arts and multimedia community to a health and medical services community to an international cultural community). The goal is to increase student motivation at higher academic levels away from the traditional environment of large, impersonal, comprehensive high schools. In smaller communities of only several hundred students (rather than several thousand) teachers and students are able to form more personal relationships and, as teachers, we are able to offer more personalized instruction. It's very exciting.

HJHS also has four counselors on site, as well as a clinical psychiatrist, a gang suppression supervisor, an on-site social worker, and an assistant principle specifically for at-risk students. You know, just your typical, everyday Sac-City high school.