2009 retrospective thing

I have always been a "where was I this time last year/month/week?" kind of a person. So, without feeling the need to analyze or justify that mentailty, I am doing that same sort of inventory as this year/decade draws to a close. Trite and cliche, I know, and well, I am doing it anyway.

I was de-freaking-pressed last year. I mean, I don't know how I made it through! Only, I actually do know, and now I want to say what I am grateful and thankful and hopefully understand and value these things even more.

This past year I depended on my friends. The people who loved me when I could not and would not love myself loved me when I was pretty bitter and unloveable. Today as I stand in the present wedged between the past and the future, I know that the buddies who love me today and loved me yesterday will love me tomorrow. That is a huge, huge, tiny thing that I appreciate more and more everyday.

This past year I went from a job I tolerated to a job I love, and I know that I am not defined by the place that signs the check or the title I have. I LOVE what I do, and I will always find a way to do it. Paid, not paid, professional, unprofessional, everyday I learn that I really believe that written communication is the last equal footing there is in this world, and I will teach others how to be amazing at this while remaining true themselves. Grammar doesn't mean anything if the words aren't grown from the soil of individual thought.

Tonight I am sitting in a room overlooking the cold Florida beach. Today I sat in the sun and just giggled at the about face my life has made from last year to now. Next year may be better, it may be worse, but every year teaches me something I thought I already knew in a way that quietly knocks me down every time.

Happy New Year.

Christmas card

It's just a funny pic that continues to make me laugh every time I see it. That's all.

Because I have a stack that needs grading, a book that needs averaging, and a syllabus that needs writing, I am going to take some time to update my blog!

I am pretty content with recent events. Survived the Shit Storm of 2009 and have prepared for the impending January crisis over taxes that will generally happen somewhere around the New Year. No news there.

Loving the car, ready for the license plate to be registered, loving the new bank, and secretly giving the bird to every Regions bank I pass.

Gearing up for basketball with buds and the kiddo. Needing to go get tickets today. Hoping I don't forget.

Sure there is a song that I could listen to for inspiration. Wishing I was done or at least in the possession of a magic wand... I have been wanting one for ages. Ages!

Hug a reindeer, kiss a kid, eat a cookie, and have a happy holiday season.

A Rose by any other name

There she is!

Today is another day of productive grading and friendship in Nashville. I swear I don't live here!

Isn't it funny that every trip to Nashville, every weekend of the last three weeks, has been made in a different car? Each trip made was unsure of the next day and unsure of the coming week, and yet here I am! There is a new car in the lot where my junked old car once sat. If someone had told me last week about where I would be this week, would I have believed that person? I have no idea. I know that anything is possible and that taking the first step is how it is done.

Saying it again, knowing that I have said it already, I feel like such a grown-up.

Question

Alright, think about this. Are you who you are or who you want to be? Seriously, I mean, I am 30 years old, and this seemingly amateur question keeps rolling around in my head. Are we on a road to self discovery or are we on a quest to be some kind of super-self, forged from the baser fires of human desire? I really don't know!

I am pretty sure it is the knowledge of the difference and not some sort of cosmic, judgemental scale that places me here to ask this question. No one answer is any better than the other. Option A or Option B do not determine your or my place in the world. I guess I just want to know which journey am I on? Am I looking in to be out or am I looking out to be in?

Doubtful that I am the first to ask this question but sure that I am asking it of myself for the first time, I am going to go with I am who I want to be, but that person is dependent on who I have been shaped to be thus far.

That is not a fence type answer, I think it leans toward who I want to be more than who I am.

The coffee isn't ready yet, and my fingers feel clumsy this morning. Spending time with someone else's family later today, and I secretly pretend that they are mine. Not such a secret now.

No news on the car. Progress is being made. Listening to tapes in the old red car. Feels like high school. Probably the subconscious source of such nascent introspection.

Friday night lights (on tow trucks)

In Nashville this morning. Drove up Friday night to spend some QT with one of best buds and oldest friends. At the 65/40 split, my old faithful car coughed, sputtered, and gave up the ghost. That line from Braveheart, that was what I thought of first. "Death comes to us all." My little car, who is a who and not a what, passed away 12.6 miles from my destination, and now she sits in my friend's parking lot awaitng the inevitability of her junkyard demise.

Does anyone know anyone who wants a good deal on some extremely new and hardly used BF Goodrich's? I was so happy about the deal I got on them,and I will sell them for less than what I paid. They still have the little new tire marks on them... Driven on them less than 2 weeks... New rainX wipers, too... Oh, and the new headlights...

Mom and step-dad not being supportive. No news there. I can here the "I told you so" in the back of everything my mother has said to me since Friday night. They own 5 cars, they had time this weekend, and they have not offered to let me borrow one to get to work on Monday. I don't actually know how I am going to get to work on Monday or the days after that.

Did I mention that they own 5 cars, and that they only drive one of those cars on Friday night and once in the summer when they drive to Florida?

There is all kinds of good in this. Seriously. Towing my car from the interstate to Sarah's apt only cost me 4 dollars. The guy driving the truck was not creepy and he was kind. A guy from a repair shop drove to where my car is parked and told me not to waste my money fixing a car that wasn't worth the cost of repair. My friend's husband has friends in from out of town, and they have generously offered to take me home because it is on the way. My friends have made so many unbelievably kind offers, including the offer of letting me use one of their cars, and they have been so nice about everything. Sarah talked the her apt manager, and made sure my car would be ok sitting in their lot for a week. Seriously, a lot of good things have happened.

Oh, and Friday night we went to see the best movie of 2009. I wanted to run back in to the theater and watch it again. The Blind Side. Go see it. We got a ton of school work done yesterday. She studied for law school stuff, and I graded 24 essays in one sitting. Today we will do more of the same, and there is a real possibility that I will be able to finish everything before schools starts back on Monday. I told you, lots of good things happened this weekend. Did I even mention the fabulous Indian food?

I also got a chance to really talk to my friend about the events in my head. She just understands, and that makes me feel better than anythng else right now. It's just so good to have a friend who loves me, puts up with me, and understands what I am trying to understand.

Now, I wish she would wake up so that we can get this productive day moving. Hehehe. I will start the coffee. That may do the trick.

Tumble dry ideas

Everyday is like rising closer and closer to the surface. Yesterday was full of feeling like myself. Today, I have been very upbeat, but not unrealistically happy. I am looking at just how sporadic and erratic my feelings can be, and I am just sort of thinking about how a thermostat would try to regulate. No, this is not ideal, but I think it is still better than just wishing to be better and that being all I do.

Basketball was good last night, and even though it was a loss, I think our reputation is a lot more in line with where it was that where it was going. My student who was on ESPN until midnight last night was in class at 11:30 today. I staggered.

Friends are so important. I keep thinking about that these days. The ones I have had and the ones I will have and the ones I have right now, they are all such a part of me. I am missing one friend so much. I wanted to watch basketball with this friend, I wanted to laugh at this CD with this friend, and I wanted to just drink a cup of coffee with this friend. I won't be doing any of those things. That is how it seems. I am not even sure if I should hold out or keep walking away. I keep looking back, that is for sure. I keep looking for my friend to say that things will be ok, and that we can be friends again. It's the saddest thing I think these days, and I try so hard not to think about it too much.

Have you ever felt like you are so much better at being who you are, but that the who you are never really gets to be seen the way you want it to be? That is another thing I think about. I know, it seems incredibly self-absorbed and narcissistic, and I can be those things, but the drive causes my mind to wander, and sometimes I get stuck on self without any way away from it. Just thoughts that tend to drift in and out, but they are the thoughts that seem most celebrated in a blog where I share MY thoughts. That's all I'm sayin...

Lonely Island songs in my head today, too. It's difficult to teach without smirking as I go through the lyrics to the last track on the CD in my head. If you don't know, it is a song about three 13 year old boys who have sex with an alien (at the same time thanks to the generous, hospitable anatomy of the arguably male alien)in order to preserve the alien race. After the group climax, the alien grants the young boys a wish. They all agree that they want to be the "greatest fake MC's on earth." Try teaching comparison and contrast essay writing with that song in your head...

Repurposing office supplies

Got through the weekend and made it back to work today. It started to rain somewhere around mile marker 52, and I looked forward to testing out my new wiper blades. Looking for the little things. Read a lot this weekend, didn't grade that much, and cooked a few meals. Doing instead of not doing seems to be a good step to make.

Using office supplies to keep my hair off my shoulders today. With my door open, I am sure someone will wander by and wonder why that girl has a huge paper clip holding her hair up. The rain has made the air in the office humid, and I just can't stand that feeling. I improvise with office supplies.

Wrote poetry in my head today. Going to see if I can remember it...

Heavy velvet slumber stealing sleepy sighs
Wrap me up, hold me on
Around deeper thoughts and preventing inspired rise
Cocoon, a womb, red heartbeat
Breathe more or less against the morning writhe
Broken skin, torn will, pain
Unreal and unspoken in the primal vernal eternal sunrise
Here, near, above
From tiny shoulder to weak elbow and skinned knees to parted thighs
Day night and night day
The vicious velvet curtain takes all and leaves the lips and sighs

I guess I am trying to let the darkness out. I do kind of feel better.