Thanks, Anne Lamott

I have been reading Bird by Bird, by Anne Lamott. It is her book about writing, and I am finding it to be very helpful, not just in writing but also in life. I always thought I would enjoy her books, because I am a huge fan of Donald Miller and I once heard him described as a male Anne Lamott, and it turns out to be true. It is so nice to read someone who either expresses things you've always believed or puts into words for you things you didn't know you believed.

Also, I can relate to a lot of what she says. I don't know if it's a writer thing or a human thing, but I tend to go around talking to myself a lot. Not out loud (what would people think?), but if I turn off one conversation another one pops up, so unless I can be distracted by an imminent and wholly engaging task, I don't bother trying to stop it. And lo and behold, I read in Bird by Bird the following: "Left to its own devices, my mind spends much of its time having conversations with people who aren't there."

It's not just me!

I also read these lines this week: "Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor, the enemy of the people. It will keep you cramped and insane your whole life...." True, I think. I keep reading quotes and hearing speakers who deal with taking action in life, doing what you know you're supposed to do, having difficult but necessary conversations, taking risks at your job or hobbies or relationships in the hopes of making them better, and so I think maybe God is hinting something to me.

I have always been cramped by perfectionism. 'Tis better to never try and never fail than try and maybe fail, is often my motto. I am beginning to believe it's false, because most of the best things I've done in my life have been somewhat risky (or at least their outcome has), and I would have regretted never doing them. Even when the risk didn't necessarily pan out to something good, I was glad I did them.

The moral of the story: don't let perfectionism keep you from trying.

Eavesdropping on Genius Kids

So, I haven't done much blogging lately because I started my long-term substitute job, and it turns out working almost full-time and having a baby doesn't leave much time (or, perhaps more importantly, energy) for blogging. But I am teaching at a school for profoundly gifted students, and I had an experience the other day that sort of summarized the culture I am in. In a lot of ways these kids are just typical kids, but they are also very smart, and sometimes I overhear things that remind of that.

The other day we learned the word for "kiss-up" in class, and someone asked if the word meant "brown-noser."

"Sí," I said.

"What's a brown-noser?" asked a different kid.

"A sycophant," explained another.

"Ah, okay."

All was explained.

Why I Love My Job

I realized that I perhaps ought to clarify why I love my job, instead of just stating that I do love it. So, here are the reasons I love teaching Spanish:

1) I get to do something different every day. Not just different tasks. Some days involve more direct instruction, other days involve student-led activities. If a particular topic is difficult or boring, the next section of grammar or vocabulary is often interesting. I love my job because I don't feel like I'm doing the same thing over and over, and there is progression.

2) I can move around! I can be in my office, in the classroom, at my desk, at the whiteboard, standing in the back to watch student presentations, roaming the room to make sure everyone is speaking Spanish, etc. Once upon a time I had a job as an editor. The company for which I worked was great ("Fun" was one of their top ten core values) and I had great coworkers, and of course I enjoy editing, but every day I would arrive and sit for several hours at the same desk in the same cubicle staring at the same computer and doing similar, repetitive things.

3) I get to interact with people. Again, as much as I love reading, writing, and proper grammar and spelling, being alone eventually makes me feel isolated and sullen. Interacting with people gets me outside my own brain and gives me new perspectives. Plus, people are just plain interesting.

4) I have creative control. This is similar to being able to do something different every day. Even though I usually follow a syllabus prepared by a world languages department, I can take the day's topic (exciting things like "Indirect Object Pronouns" and "Food-Related Vocabulary" and do almost whatever I want with it. We can play games, have conversations, perform skits, fill out worksheets, create menus, role-play, or do a number of things. It's a fun challenge trying to guarantee that neither my students nor I become bored with material.

5) I get to help people. (I must note here that a number of my students might claim that forcing them to learn Spanish is not helping them. They are wrong.) There is nothing more fun that seeing something click in a person's brain. Through explanations, input, guided practice, and structured output, I can help people learn to communicate in another language. Students go from knowing very little Spanish to writing entire compositions, and there is something so exciting to me about being part of that.

That's why I love my job.

So now my question for you all is (and this is assuming you love all or part of what you do): Why do you love your job? Whether you work full- or part-time time, inside or outside the home, why do you love what you do? It's fun finding out what people enjoy because then you get to know them better.

I Want My Brain Back

I've always been a little spacey. My husband would probably say that I am very spacey, but I'm not sure that being spacey and unobservant are the same thing. Anyway, I am already off my main point.

I became even more spacey when I was pregnant. It was like my brain was continually in a fog, and I would misplace things, forget appointments and anything in my schedule that was even slightly out of the ordinary, misspeak, and be unable to remember details, words I wanted to use, the last thing that was said to me, or the second half of the sentence I was in the middle of uttering.

Well, finally I wasn't pregnant anymore, and my brain seemed to emerge from its foggy surroundings, but unfortunately the spaceyness is just as bad as it was when I was pregnant. This is not due to surging, raging hormones, but rather to the lack of sleep and the fact that I'm now keeping track of details for two people instead of one. I don't feel like my mind is foggy, but rather that there are huge black gaps in my thoughts. I am still losing things, forgetting things, and trailing off in the middle of sentences while a smile slowly spreads across Ian's face and he finally repeats what I've said so far so I can remember where I was.

I became especially frustrated yesterday evening when I opened the cabinet, excited about my evening snack of a banana with some Nutella, and discovered a half-full gallon of milk in there. I don't remember having milk since my morning coffee (not that my memories mean much anymore), and the milk was room temperature, so I can only assume it sat there all day. I neither noticed the milk in the cabinet earlier nor noticed its absence in the refrigerator. And Ian doesn't drink milk, so unfortunately I had no hope of blaming him.

Ahhh (<--that's supposed to be a sigh). I can only hope that as I adjust more and more to motherhood, I will gradually recover the use of my brain and eliminate both the fog and the blank spots. Maybe my mom friends can give me hope that even if my mind never fully returns to normal, I can at least operate around my new levels of spaceyness.

I Heart My Job

I do! I've been feeling grateful because I didn't even realize how much I like what I do (teaching Spanish) until this summer. I opted not to teach any summer session courses at UNR because I wanted to spend the whole summer with Alexandra. I am very glad I did so, because I love hanging out with my baby girl and I don't think I could handle working just yet.

But I have a friend who teaches Spanish at UNR and who is currently teaching one of the summer session courses. He's going to be out of town for a couple days next week, so I'm teaching his classes one of those days. He's not giving me anything for teaching his class, and I had to make sure that Ian could watch Alexandra, and I'll have to get up early and teach an 8:00 a.m. class that lasts two hours on a day that is typically my most busy day of the week.

And yet when he asked if I wanted to cover his class, I felt like he was doing me a favor.

And that's when I realized how fortunate I am to be able to do what I do. It's fulfilling and fun, and I'd want to do it even if I wasn't paid (and I could afford to not make money, of course).

I love my job!