Perspective

Therapy intervenes.

This is the part where it gets pointed out to me that crushes are normal, I am normal and a crush is not a bad thing. Further there was a lot said to the effect that men and women are designed to be attracted to each other, in most male female freindships there is an imbalance of romantic attraction and that most effective adults simply acknowledge the feelings and then press on.

The therapist and I discussed what my options were. Discontinuing contact is not the answer nor a reasonable option considering the situation. IT wouldn't be fair to him, either, he didn't do anything wrong. Neither did I. Neither am I.

My therapist wanted to know why the idea of having a crush on someone was an idea that had me panicking and in tears. At first I wasn't sure. Still not really, except to say that crushes never work out for me. The idea that I find someone interesting garauntees they don't think of me as anything but a sexless, benevolant aunt. That is so good for my ego by the way.

So I am trying to look at this positively. I am going to learn to deal with these kinds of issues with out having nervous break downs and crying jags. We'll see how it goes. In the meantime, while if he was a girl and we were just friends it would be appropriate, I will not invite him to dinner.

But I will enjoy the friendship and not panic in the meantime.

Perspective.

God, Help me!

"You are not arrogant, you are just really honest and you know what you can do."

"I wish I was more like you."

"I really admire that about you."

Stupid boys who have no idea what they are doing to my insides need to shut up.

No, you cannot be my writing partner, cannot direct shakespeare with me, cannot sit down and talk to me about what I know about literature.

Not a good idea.

I don't care how nice you are, how sweet you are, how earnest you are. You are playing with fire and you don't even know.

They don't see me as a woman and they don't think about what they do to me.

Oh, and he graduated from high school in '01. I'd been teaching for 2 years! He could have called me Miss X! Oh, heck no!

I am in so much trouble.

Trusted friend texts, "Go 4 it."

What an idiot! Another stupid boy. I am surrounded by stupid boys.

Why does this happen to me?

Crush

There is a good possibility that I am nursing a growing crush on someone. This is not a good thing. These things never end well and my heart always seems to get ripped to pieces. Often without the crush even ever knowing so they go on being a good friend. That makes it worse and all the more dysfunctional. Seeing it coming doesn't even help. I can't seem to stop it.

So I called a trusted friend and asked him to slap me stupid. He seems to think this is a good thing and laughed jovially. When I am in tears at three in the morning I'm calling his but, let me just tell you. We'll see how funny he thinks it is then.

This is going to be a problem, I can just tell. That's why I've avoided this situation, successfully I might add for years. No the previous situation does not count, it was not, nor ever will be a crush or true romantic entanglement it was just loneliness, stupidity and boundary issues. But that's the point. That wasn't a crush and see what a mess it was? Exactly!

This is going to be a disaster. God must find me really amusing. Here, let me put a jester hat on to complete the look.

Are you kidding me?

Monday greeted me with two parent emails.

The first was anonymous. You cannot be serious. What kind of ridiculous parent e-mails a teacher anonymously. What a moron. They were e-mailing to "inquire" aka complain about my vocabulary quizzing methods. My gut was to beat them like a rented mule verbally until they bled from every pore. Now, obviously, that is not what I did. I found an administrator. He recommended being positive and enforcing the idea that I do not punish students for moronic parents. So I did. However I had a long talk with all my classes about asking questions, why I was doing things the way I was and I may have mentioned that receiving anonymous e-mails tended to make me felt like I was being stalked. Hopefully that should clear up the issue.

The other e-mail was from a parent who is a teacher in my county. They were reaming me because I was forcing to make their child read obscene filth and further denying them their right to read the bible continuously in my class. This parent quoted three (count 'em) three passages of the students rights code at me. They also threatened to meet with meeting with the principal if I was not reasonable on this issue. So I being the reasonable god fearing individual that I am said... "Whatever you want. You tell me... That's fine!" Oh then the tune changes. I was wonderful. Further, I was the teacher and therefore he trusted me to pick what was best and necessary for his son.

The part that kills me was that by Tuesday afternoon a different student came and asked me if it was true that they could read The Left Behind Series in place of To Kill a Mockingbird. I think I threw up a little bit in my mouth. It is such a sad balance.

Parents are so crucial, and there are a lot of good ones out there. I've met them. It just seems like none of them are ever the parents of my students... That's not true. There have been some good ones of those too, it's just...

Really nice guy, new teacher at our school. I showed him my conundrums for the day. He laughed. He said it was nice to know that there there were always going to be pains in the butt, even after his first year. His laughter helped me keep the whole ridiculous mess in perspective.

But, still, are you kidding me?

Plugging

Sometimes it seems like there is so much welling up in my heart and yet there is no where to express it, no way to explain it and no one to listen anyway. Other times I feel like I am shouting so much everyone is covering their ears as they pass... So still no one hears.

It is not actually an alone feeling, exactly. It is more that I feel incomplete and incapable to express. It is not distress. It is definately not depression, it just is.

There if fullfillment in my life, taking care of Nana, work, camp, church, the dogs, my writing, so it is not emptiness.

It's more like emotional restless leg syndrome.

My father and I spoke this weekend. I need to e-mail the head of the PhD program that I did not get into and find out what the problem with my applicaiton was. I don't want to. I'm not even sure I want the PhD anymore, nor that I want to know why... But I also know that I need to know why I didn't get in and whether or not I can before I can really say no.

I am begining the next phase of my therapy as well. I have to take all the incidents I wrote out (well over 50 events...) and then fill out this whole chart about what happened, how I felt, what it contradicted in me and a bunch of other stuff. I told my therapist that I didn't want to do this anymore. He laughed. It's the same as the PhD thing. Except in this case, I know I will do this and I will finish whether I want to or not because when I am done I will be happy. I might even be free. Free-er than I ever remember at least.

Anyway, I'm just plugging along out here.

Encouraged

Today I saw a glimmer. It wasn't a huge thing, but today it was enough.

It is so frustrating to work hard and be tired all the time and to make sacrifices of calories and not see the scale change. Today we did measurements. I've lost a half inch off my waist, my hips, my thighs and my calves, each.

Today, that was enough.

I think I made a genuine friend this week. One I kind of hadn't really seen coming. A confidant and a kindred spirit.

This weekend my mother decided not to come for a visit.

Last weekend I spent the day with two delightful women and the most delightful little boy at an open air blue grass concert.

Today I decided to plan a surprise 50th Birthday Party for a wonderful man. Other people want to help.

Yesterday I got an iPod.

Today I spoke to a terrific young man on e-mail.

Today I taught great kids how to write sonnets.

So today, I was encouraged.

Today it was enough.

Today I got to talk to my Dad. And I got to kiss Nana goodnight. The dog came and cuddled in my lap.

It was enough.

Oh My!

Somtimes I think I must be God's Jester. I mean I must just give him rolling fits of laughter. Course, if that was the case, that would imply I try to be amusing and end up in these off the wall scenarios. I swear I don't work at it at all.

My brother and I had a conversation today about someone I know. My brother (the Southern Baptist Minister, I might add) refers to this individual by a a common nickname for the name Richard (and this person's name is not Richard, by the way.)

There is someone in my life that I find myself defending on a regular basis to the other people in my life that I care about. It's rather frustrating. They only see the one angle of the picture and I see the entire art work. To be fair, their assessment of the part they see is accurate, but there is so much more to this person.

Anyway, my brother kept calling him Richard. I pointed out that I was under the impression that in married life Richard is actually a really nice thing. My brother informed me that this was Richard with a gold ring and a leash, but I was dealing with an uncontrolled immature Richard and therefore should be more aware.

Poor Richard. They've never even met him and my family has issues with him. I imagine he would be apauled. Yet, regardless, I will stand by Richard in this stressful time in his life. He really is struggling and my heart goes out to him.

Figuring out our lives is such a difficult thing. My prayers are with Richard tonight.

State of the Weekend...

Nana and I were sitting in the living room and Batman Forever was on. Nana announces, "this is a crazy story that makes no sense, but I will say this. The costumes are very striking."

Anyway.

This was a good weekend. Good Therapy (yes, I'm still crazy enough to need help, don't despair I haven't changed too much yet...), Good time doing nails, good meeting working on the choreography for the children's musical (and my music partners from college/BSU ministries are laughing themselves sick over me and my machinations), good summer picnic cooking, and then good times with friends at an open air blue grass concert in Atlanta. It was a good Saturday. On Sunday church, parents meeting for children's musical, lunch with good friends and a leisurely afternoon with naps and computers and music ending with a really good grilled cheeses sandwich and hot tea.

It was a good weekend.

I enjoyed it, I was happy with my life and I spent a lot of time reflecting on it in the process, I might add. These were the things that struck me.

I am growing, changing, learning, and getting healthy. Further, other people are noticing that.

There are still many things that I am concerned and frustrated with, more specifically there are a couple people I am specifically concerned and frustrated about. Mom comes to mind, Nana and a gentleman or two. But it's OK. I have a handle on me, and my place in their lives and I'm good with that. In this case, it's enough.

I need to write more. I want to write more. I will write more.

Working out is important and it's good that I am doing it, but in the near future I am going to cut back to an average of three rather than four. I really don't need to be tired all the time. What's the point of healthy and strong if I can't enjoy it? I will not feel guilty or cowed when I make that decision.

Nana is definitely not the whole person she once was, but there is more there than not, and we either need to make it better or accept the inevitable. I have a time table in mind now and I'm OK with that, and so is Nana, when she remembers.

I have a huge amount of friends. I really do. They are wonderful. I miss them when I am not with them, and I am so blessed to have them.

I need more music in my life.

The most confusing question in my life is why people see me as Miss Fix It and simultaneously think I am incapable of taking care of myself and/or solving my own problems... How does that make any sense?

This was a good weekend. I didn't want to be a cow at all.

Here's hoping for as good a week. Mom is "dropping by" on Friday night on her way down to Florida. We'll see how it goes.

No One Comments Anymore...

I'm just talking to myself again, aren't I? Oh well.

I'm going to make more of an effort to work on my novel again. I think I may have even found a writing accountability partner. I wrote a page today. Just talking to him about it yesterday kind of got me motivated today.

Friday is William Carlos Williams day. I'll be talking to my students about real love, romance and my great grandparents. I won't have much time to write. Plus I have to do grades. I find myself disappointed about that. This is a good thing. Maybe the muse is coming back?

That's a rhetorical question, because I'm talking to myself, apparently.

Blessed

Some days when I have the overwhelming urge to slap duct tape over Nana's non stop talking mouth I remind myself how blessed I am to have her.

It is nice to come home to someone.

This is not the vision I had for my life at all, and yet it is a blessing.

So today, I don't want to be a cow anymore. I am enjoying being a teacher, a BSA medic and Nana's granddaughter.

This is going to be a good year. It may be my last with Nana as my roommate and so I need to remind myself and remember how blessed I am to have her.

Oh, and I just saw the bud-light commercial with the guy who steals the beers and the barking dogs that follow him ever after and Nana just looked up and said, "Maybe Piper and Roo feel the same way about the telephone." Oh my! I am so blessed.

I love this poem and it's totally how I felt today!

Cow
By Selima Hill

I want to be a cow
and not my mother’s daughter.
I want to be a cow
and not in love with you.
I want to feel free to feel calm.
I want to be a cow who never knows
the kind of love you ‘fall in love with’ with;
a queenly cow, with hips as big and sound
as a department store,
a cow the farmer milks on bended knee,
who when she dies will feel dawn
bending over her like lawn to wet her lips.

I want to be a cow,
nothing fancy –
a cargo of grass,
a hammock of soupy milk
whose floating and rocking and dribbling’s undisturbed
by the echo of hooves to the city;
of crunching boots;
of suspicious-looking trailers parked on verges;
of unscrupulous restaurant-owners
who stumble, pink-eyed, from stale beds
into a world of lobsters and warm telephones;
of streamlined Japanese freighters
ironing the night,
heavy with sweet desire like bowls of jam.

The Tibetans have 85 words for states of consciousness.
This dozy cow I want to be has none.
She doesn’t speak.
She doesn’t do housework or worry about her appearance.
She doesn’t roam.
Safe in her fleet
of shorn-white-bowl-like friends,
she needs, and loves, and’s loved by,
only this –
the farm I want to be a cow on too.

Don’t come looking for me.
Don’t come walking out into the bright sunlight
looking for me,
black in your gloves and stockings and sleeves
and large hat.
Don’t call the tractorman.
Don’t call the neighbours.
Don’t make a special fruit-cake for when I come home:
I’m not coming home.
I’m going to be a cowman’s counted cow.
I’m going to be a cow
and you won’t know me.

Source: Astley, Neil (ed.) (2002) Staying Alive: real poems for unreal
times, Tarset: Bloodaxe.

The poetry book this is from, by the way, Staying Alive, totally awesome. It's a book everyone should have. There is another poem in there, called "A Puppy Called Puberty" that is terrific. Hysterical too.

Poetry

If novels are movies, short stories are like a series of pictures and and poetry is an impressionist or abstract paintings. Impressionist paintings don't have defines lines, they get more clear and defined the further away you get from it. Abstract pictures are based in concept and not reality. Stories are about conveying ideas, messages and concepts. Poetry is about conveying emotions. Emotions don't have edges they are more defined the further away you are and the lines get blurrier the closer you get. Poetry is based in the concept, and often have little to do with the concrete reality.

Further finding poetry you like is like walking through a huge art galary. There are lost os painting you pass quickly saying, "I don't get it." There are others you pass and think, in passing, "that's nice enough." and then there are the ones you stop and stand in front of for hours because they speak to your soul. Poems are hit or miss like that. Critics and peers don't matter, only what speaks to your soul in that way only art can.

That is what I told my kids today as I introduced poetry. I read them Mark Strand's Eating Poetry and other poems I like (Cow, Forgetfulness, Being in Love, Happiness, Dark Angel and Plath's Daddy.) I couldn't read them "A Puppy Called Puberty" because I I didn't want to deal with the parental phone calls.

Anyway, first period was kind of cold, second period was very warm and third period was two thirds enthralled and one third asleep.

But all in all it was a good day doing the part of my job I truly love, sharing the joy that is poetry.

Waiting

In order to wait for something you have to believe that something is coming.

So, I'm not waiting.

I'm just standing here.

Alone.

It's a funny thing the cycles of emotion we go through. Some days I really am thrilled, fullfilled, satisfied and then other days I'm not.

Which day is which has no bearing on reality or events, simply how I feel.

I also think if you've been hoping for milk your whole life and in the end all you get is Skim, you may enjoy it, it may be the best, as far as you've tased, but you still got gyped on the deal. Waiting for the Skim milk you have to bolt down because your time is almost up. After watching so many others throw away the whole milk they could have had their whole lives to enjoy...

It's late, I'm most likely hormonal, and it has not been a good weekend, really.

Not that anything happened, particualarly, just that for whatever reason this weekend I am just standing, not waiting, and I have never liked Skim milk.

21st Century Sandy

So now I've got a laptop, iTunes and Wireless Internet.

Color me modern...

And smart-play-lists rock. I could play DJ for hours.

I can't wait to get my iPod.

I was all ready and then they next generation-ed, so I'm gonna wait another few weeks.

Hello 21st Century!

What month is it?

It's barely September and we are already up to our neck in the planning of camp.

God Help Me!

It's going to be worse this year I can tell. I am too invested in these young men, I think. Too involved in this world. But when I try to step away I miss it so much.

Dad says I will do it until something better and more diverting comes along. I won't just stop.

He's right.

Sometimes standing in all these age groups... 15, 18, 21, 31, 41, 49, 57, 83, it's hard not to get dizzy.

Oh, did I mention I'm directing the children's musical... So add 6-10 to the list.

It's barely September and we are talking about October, January, March and May...

More dizzy.

Better get better at dancing...

Just a thought.

Sometimes when a door keeps slamming shut in your life, it's not God testing your resolve. It really is him saying no.

I'm just saying.

Power Squats

You know those cartoons where the character ends up with his rear on fire and races around until he finds a lake or pail or whatnot to soak it in...

Yeah, after my work out today, I feel like that...

There has even been the funny music and sound effects...

Sparks

So I went on a "date" last week. It was nice, he was nice, and I had a nice time. He's older and for all that I have Nana his life is much more complicated thatn mine. OK. That in and of itself doesn't bother me. His complications don't scare me much anyway (and it's not like he's married or works for the CIA, just so you know...) but...

Oh here we go...

There is potential there, so it's not like there was nothing, and you know I don't believe in love at first sight, instant chemistry or lightning...

but,

I guess I expected somthing more, a connection, a click...

Add to that, he only e-mailed once so far, three lines and no reply to my babble.

I accept complications, and I'm not writing him off, I understand obligations, but...

My gut tells me this wasn't it.

I'm working hard, I'm busy and I have a lot going on, not to mention going for me, and it's really not a big deal. I'm not upset, though maybe a bit disappointed, and I'm not sulking, fretting or pineing...

But in the absense of the sparks, I find that this evening I am as usualy, sitting in the dark.

If this was what was nessesary to clear out the cobwebs of past confusions, it was worth it and I'll take it. I'm used to the dark anyway.

But I was hopeful.

I don't really drink and I find this very disturbing....

And no, I'm not getting drunk to help prove this...

You Are Sex On the Beach

When comes to drinking, you like it to go down smooth. You really don't like the taste of alcohol - just its effect on you. So, you're proud to get drunk on fruity, girly drinks. Because once you're liquored up, the fun begins!

What Alcoholic Drink Are You?