>I have not blogged in a long time. I have less time than I used to have. And I have enough company that I need not use this space to replace socialization. I get plenty of “social” at work (there are few places more social than a high school-granted they are all 6-7 years younger than I), so, when I get home, I almost prefer a bit of alone time. Whereby, during the summer I was a bit lonely and when I got back from being in class, where I knew few people, then left my phone on the counter because there were few people to listen to me talk, I needed to type and pretend like more than three people were reading it.
“Alone time”…what is that again? Oh yea- that’s when I drive four hours to college station by myself once every 3 weeks. Haha. I am trying to healthily balance being a good teacher (this requires a lot of research since i am teaching some things that I have not learned myself since HS and I wasn’t necessarily paying great attention when I learned those. aka: big time commitment), getting enough SLEEP, getting adequate exercise/acivity from Rock Climbing to bike riding and using the Liftime Fitness membership I purchased, spending time with my family and doing chores around the house, and getting a good dose of social time with people my age- most of the teachers I work with are wonderful but older than me and of course the ppl that I spend the most time with are much younger all though I love my students oh so much, and then having quiet time in which I can pray and journal and coffee in a big chair indian style- a few weeks without that and i just don’t feel as alive. I have not done arts and crafts in a long time… and I am still on the late August journal- that’s wierd for me. My church is wonderful. My community group is beautiful. My accountability group still loves me a lot. I’ve gone dancing up here enough times to keep me sane and I am required to drive to College Station enough that I don’t cry from missing it. Men confuse me, but I don’t mind that. I confuse men, and I mind that less. Sometimes I really feel like I get up, race the sun to school, monitor mild maniacs in the hallway (that is not negative, it is funny), then teach 30 teenagers at a time for 8 hours with a thirty minute soup break, then tutor them one-on-one after that, then grade what they did, then eat something, then plan what we are doing the next day, then sleep a little bit. I have gotten sick because of not sleeping enough twice and i had to pull off the road one morning because fell asleep at the wheel- bad and scary. But I hate the scrambled feeling of not being prepared. My first period class probably thinks I’m incompitant because they are my ginny pigs class. But once second period comes in I’m set and the day runs smoothly. I’m relatively quick on my toes. and i try to make them think. i ask them a lot of questions during lecture to get them to think and anticipate as well as to stir discussion. Some classes are AWESOME in group discussion! I love it. Different classes have different personalities- i have always heard that but now i really see it. We have discussed security and freed om and economics and development and maintainance of corporations and the environment and photography and self-esteem and how to treat janitors. A lot of kids are very opinionated and they seem to like to hear what i have to say about these things. I play devils advocate- and while i do my best to be unbiased on political things, they are usually curious and responsive to what I think about what we discuss- which is nice but not as important. I don’t want them to just know facts about history. This is “social studies;” i want them to leave my class with a better understanding of society and how to develop their own opinions and how to listen to others. I am really enjoying it- but I do not deny my near exhaustion. I think I already told you enough about that. Ha. I have had some interesting scenarios in my class room. Crazy attention seeker student who cannot stay in his chair for more than five minutes stole my orange juice, hid it from me, took a drink of it, and through it against the back wall last week. That was interesting. I have had a bright laser-like-but-not-quite pen light shined in my eyes while i lectured. One boy got up and punched another one in his seat. Another does things like stand up in his chair randomly in the middle of class and stare at me until i tell him to sit down. If I look at him like he is foolish and ask him to get down without taking away from classtime to give him attention, then his is less likely to do it as often. they are so funny like that. I have had a lot of neat conversations with a bunch of girl students. Football games are a blast. i make my rounds to visit my band kids and my sterling stars and my cheerleader and my Lumberjack boys that treat me like their mom. The lumberjacks stand down on the field and do stunts during games then they run back to me like Ms Haynes Ms Haynes How did that look? high fives high fives. Ms Haynes Ms Haynes watch this! And like three of them run into my classroom nearly everyday after school with some bright idea that they have been wating since third period to tell me. I really like it. I have a bunch o f students that want to start a swing dance club. So we are- that should be a blast. I have to decide what is safe enough to teach them and what’s a liability. I have gotten to talk to quite a few students about God already and I love that. they do too. Okay this is long enough. I’m going to drink this wine and head towards bed where i may consider day dreaming for at least twenty minutes before sleeping because it is worth it. Trust me, life without day dreaming is sad. I used to daydream in my journal too, but now it is practically back to back sermon notes. okay tat is not true, but it is pretty close.
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