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What You Should Know About Me

Posted on August 9, 2014 by auburnchick

Dear Students,

I just finished editing the Prezi I will be using to introduce myself to you on the first day of school, and I want you to know that it was a tougher job than I had anticipated.

What impression do I, your fearless leader, want to impart upon you on what is probably one of the most important days of a new school year?

The first thing you should know is how important my family is to me.

The fact that I have been married nearly twenty-five years speaks more than any essay I could write.  It speaks of much compromise and forgiveness between two people who can, at times, be very different.  It speaks of a determination not to give in and become a statistic when the going has been tough over the years.  It speaks of commitment to make things work and the celebration of rearing two children, now grown and on their own paths of adulthood.  That’s probably not something you’re used to seeing.

As a class, we will need to be forgiving of one another.  There will be days when we want to divorce each other.  You’ll celebrate the times a substitute comes in, and I’ll probably breath a sigh of relief on the rare occasions I take time off.  These breaks will have the bonus effect of making us appreciate one another and, like the Mr. and I are now doing after so many years together, we will, as a class, come together in June and celebrate our achievements…the fact that we stuck things out, even when the path wasn’t easy (think about that long stretch from January to March).

The next thing I want you to know about me is how much I love my children.  My Chicky and Rooster mean the world to me, and I go into fully Mama Beast mode if anyone or anything tries to mess with them.  They are my heart and undeserved blessings from the Lord.  My relationship with them is evidence that someone can be a decent mama despite not having one herself, and that the cycle of dysfunction can be broken.  My children represent years spent reading bed time stories together, getting up extra early before school for morning devotions and prayers, and many tears and yelling matches followed by apologies and forgiveness.

These are lessons I want to impart upon you, my students.  I want you to know that once you enter my classroom, you will forever be one of my children, and I will be very protective of you.  I will not like everything you do, and we will, at times, be dysfunctional.  In the end, though, we will be okay.  I will not judge you, even when I hold you accountable for your choices.  I will always care for you, though, even through rougher days.

In addition to my husband and my children, I want to introduce you to my fur babies, who mean so much to me.  Each one has a special story that involves rescue from a kennel or the streets.  They were abandoned, left to fend for themselves, or, in Pele’s case, rejected and taken back to the animal shelter.  Pele and Molly were selected by us to become members of our family.  Gambit, on the other hand, chose us…or rather, he was led by God to a home where he would be given the love he’d been denied for the first year of his life.

I’d also like you to see me as a person outside of my classroom…an actual “human” who does things besides attend parent conferences and write lesson plans.  I like to take care of myself by working out at the gym and getting my nails done.  I also have hobbies…or rather “sanity savers” like knitting, and you better believe that I’m going to show off a shawl or two just to show you that grannies aren’t the only ones who knit.  I’ll extend an open invitation to visit me during lunch for knitting lessons…all supplies provided free of charge thanks to generous donations by my fiber friends.  You see, it’s important to learn to relax, despite heavy responsibilities, and enjoy life a little…a lesson I’m only recently learning.

The final thing I want you to know…and probably one that won’t surprise you much given the subject I teach, is how much I love to read.  My primary job is to help you graduate by passing the State reading test.  To do that, I have a master plan for getting you to love to read.  You’ll see a picture of the stack of books I brought home this summer…most of them I read.

I want you to know that I will do just about anything…stand on chairs, sing poorly, and buy lots of books…just to get you to read.  Reading saved my life as a child by letting me know that I wasn’t alone in the world.  I don’t know how I would have survived teenager-dom without Judy Blume!  Today, you have wonderful authors like Neal Shusterman and Jennifer Brown. We’ll all become fast friends.

It is my hope that though my presentation will be filled with laughter and fun, you’ll recognize the underlying messages of love and acceptance.  I’m fully aware that some lessons will come to you as the year unfolds…that just as God led Gambit to my home, you also were led to my classroom so I could care for you…nurture you…help fill in some holes in your life, just as a few of my teachers did for me when I was your age.

This is going to be a challenging year for all of us as we adjust to new, tougher standards and a kick-butt reading test in the Spring. I want you to keep your eyes on the prize and always remember the lessons imparted to you by Yours Truly on the first day of school.

Filed under: Teaching | Tagged: | Leave a comment »

And So It Begins…

Posted on August 8, 2014 by auburnchick

As much as I’d like to, I cannot put off the inevitable…

Oh, that’s not to say that I didn’t try and even stretched out my self-allotted vacation an extra week.  I’d originally intended to get down to work on the 1st.

Ahem.

I began by cleaning up my files on Dropbox…

I did away with my lesson plans from the 2012-2013 school year.  I feel that I’ve evolved as a teacher and probably won’t want to repeat those same lessons.  Heck, if I didn’t reuse them last year (I kept those files), I know it’s dumb to think I’ll use them in the future.

I had company while I worked…

How appropriate that Arvin Sloane finally showed his true colors in the final, fifth season of Alias, which I’ve been re-watching these past few weeks.

The tone of my work certainly felt ominous as I heard the heavy footsteps of summer reluctantly plodding out the door.

heehee

Fortunately, I was buoyed by a message I received from a student I taught two years ago.

 

It’s kind of hard to feel down when you know you’ll be reunited with precious students like the one who penned those words!  I taught her two years ago.  She will be a senior this year.  She frequently visited me this past year, and I suspect she will repeat the pattern of stopping by my room enroute to whatever locale she’ll be hiding out in as she skips class.  She’s had Senioritis for three years, so she has this down pat.

😉

And so it begins…long hours prepping, all in an effort to get everything in order so the first few days of school will proceed smoothly.

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“You Want Acceptance”

Posted on August 7, 2014 by auburnchick

I seem to have become high maintenance of late, as evidenced by my third trip to my nail salon within the last week.

My most recent visit was yesterday to repair a broken nail. No, it could not wait until my appointment next week because I have a wedding to go to on Saturday.

I adore my nail technicians. They always seem to be joking around and patiently listen when you need to talk.

In short, it’s like going in for therapy and walking out with lighter burdens and pretty fingernails.

I have no idea what exactly led to the conversation I had with my nail tech yesterday. You know how women are…one topic randomly leads to another. It’s impossible for a man to connect the dots because they are scattered everywhere with no rhyme or reason.

She asked a poignant question, “Were you a happy child growing up?”

Wow. What a loaded question!

I’ve gotta tell you that at 19 years of age, I was toting around some pretty heavy emotional baggage. It made for a difficult entry into marriage, and to this day, I consider the Mr. a saint for having to put up with me.

My mom and dad divorced when Super Sis and I were very, very young. I still remember a particularly bad argument between them when my mom left the house in a huff. My dad sat, crying, on the couch, and I chased her down outside and begged her to come in and talk to him. Their talk obviously did nothing to rectify the situation, and they eventually separated.

Mom became single and left me to care for Super Sis while she worked. Sometimes we had sitters; oftentimes not. This was the 70’s…a time when people didn’t say much about this practice.

We were left to fend for ourselves, barely any food in the house, and I was terrified of eating even a slice of bread for fear that my mom would get mad at me.

I remember one night someone discovered we were home alone, and we were taken to a foster home for the evening. I’ll never forget my mom picking us up at the police station the next day and promising me it would never happen again. What that meant was that we got better at hiding the fact that we were staying home alone, as I was instructed never to open the door if someone knocked.

Mom traveled in and out of relationships. I only remember a couple of the men, and those memories are hazy, at best. I remember one I especially liked. We lived with him in his townhouse, and he treated us well. Mom eventually left him, though, and it tore my heart apart to leave the security of that home…that sense of family we had created.

Eventually, my mom met the man who I now refer to as my stepfather (for years, he was “Dad” to me…he lost that honored title after I grew up).

Things appeared, on the outside, to be going well. We moved into a house with him, and he and my mom got married. He showered presents on us, and I was happy to have a family again.

Underneath all of that niceness, though, was some not-so-niceness. While my mom worked long shifts, he began to molest me. I didn’t understand what was happening, and he told me that if I told my mom, we wouldn’t be a family any more.

The only thing I’d wanted for a long time was for someone to love us…to be accepted…so I didn’t say a word…even when this went on for several years.

When we moved to Alabama, he eventually stopped, and I hid the memories of what he had done deep inside my heart…too confused to tell anyone.

I sought acceptance in other ways…making straight A’s…doing my chores…trying everything to be the kid who didn’t make waves…the one who fit in.

My teenage years were rough in high school. It’s tough to move to a new place where people have been friends since birth…especially in a small town.

I met the Mr. when I was 17, and we married after dating for two years. The months leading up to the wedding were not easy as I began to pull away from my stepdad and his control over me. Although he wasn’t abusing me any more, he and my mom, who to that point did not know about what he’d done, still wielded tight control over my life.

That’s when my repressed memories surfaced, and I told the Mr…shortly before the wedding. We proceeded with our plans, and we moved away. I made one visit home and never returned.

Eventually, I told my mom about the abuse, but she didn’t believe me.

Yes, she rejected the truth of what I had told her. Is it any wonder that I never felt like I could tell her anything? She did, after many months, come to terms with what I’d revealed and divorced her husband. That was little consolation to me.

I shared these memories of my childhood with my nail tech. It seems random, but it wasn’t. As I said before, I have no idea what led me to speak of things I haven’t told most people, but I trust her. She’s been doing my nails for three years, and I consider her a friend.

I guess the sharing of my memories was my long-winded way (no surprise there) of answering her original question. You know that we women must give the background story before we can answer any question.

🙂

Was I a happy child, she’d asked. What do photos of me taken when I was young depict?

I asked her a couple of questions in return, “What do you think? How do you see me now?”

She said, “You want acceptance. You always apologize for everything like you need us to accept you.”

I.

Was.

Stunned.

I think that nail techs must be required to obtain psychology degrees as part of their certification process, because they certainly do know people well.

I thought about her words as I drove home, and unbidden tears began to fall as I pulled into my neighborhood.

People often see me as shy…at least until you get to know me.

I’m quiet in large groups…uncomfortable.

Even now, as I write this, I’m extremely nervous about what I’m going to wear to the wedding I’m attending on Saturday.

Why?

Because I crave the one thing I feel I don’t have…acceptance.

It’s hard to be this way.

This need drives so much of what I do, I think.

I don’t want the flab that’s crept around my body because I want my husband and others to think I’m skinny. I fear rejection if I get fat.

For so many years, I wanted my mom’s acceptance. I don’t care about that any more, but the pain of her rejection all of those years still lingers.

Ugh!

Talk about a hot mess!!!

You know…as I drove home from my nail appointment yesterday, all I wanted to do was sit and write this post, while my thoughts were fresh.

Intead, I had other things to do…a hair appointment…a huge hug to give Rooster, newly home from his summer internship in Tennessee…dinner with the Mr….and my daily Bible study.

It was in my Bible study where I found solace.

My Small Group is studying the book, Experiencing God. This week’s lessons have been about God taking the initiative, calling people into a relationship with Him, and revealing His will to them to accomplish His purposes on earth.

I am a child of God. I have been a Christian for many years…ever since I was a teenager.

God has accepted me, flawed as I am, without me having to do anything.

I don’t need to seek out the world’s acceptance. It’s as fickle as that of the teenagers I am privileged to work with ten months a year.

With His acceptance comes healing and the redirecting of my attention off of myself and onto Him and the people who do love me…my husband, my children, my sister and her family, my in-laws, and my closest friends.

I need to put this issue to bed once and for all (and myself, for that matter considering that it’s nearly 3am as I am writing this).

God loves me and sent His Son to die for me…just as I am…flab and all.

Filed under: This-n-That | 1 Comment »

Keyed Up for the Hodgepodge

Posted on August 6, 2014 by auburnchick

This week’s Hodgepodge questions are a little tough!  I’m glad, though, because my brain needs to practice stretching now that summer is nearly over and I resume my teaching responsibilities “officially” next week!  Answer on your own blog and link up with Joyce!!

1.  What would you say is the key to success?

I think to answer this question, one needs to define the word success.

Success, to me, means living up to God’s promises in a way that honors Him.  In doing so, I fulfill His purpose for my life.

Thus, to become successful, I must stay connected to Him through prayer and trust that He will equip me to do the work He has purposed for me.  It means not relying on my own strength but His.  That is the key to success…depending on Him and giving Him the glory for what I accomplish.

2.  Have you ever been to the Florida Keys? Any desire to visit that part of the US of A?

It’s kind of funny that I lived in Miami for a few years and never actually drove to the Keys!  I have been to Key West, though, courtesy of a cruise the Mr. and I took several years ago.  Honestly, I have no desire to go again.  Key West was not the cleanest place.  There are prettier parts of Florida that I have seen.  In fact, I live in a city that hosts the most beautiful beaches in Florida!

3.  When and where did you last see a real live donkey? Monkey? Turkey?

Let’s see…I have no idea when I saw live donkeys or turkeys, but I did see live monkeys when I was at the Animal Kingdom at Disney World.  They were precious!!!

4.  An old Portuguese proverb says, ‘Beware of the door with too many keys.’ What do you think this means? Share an example of how this has proven true or false in your own life. 

Oh, my brain has been on vacation too long, I fear.  I have no idea what this means!!  Maybe it means to take great care when you have too many ways to the path you are headed down.  I think this quote speaks about being focused despite choices laid before you.

For me, personally, this speaks to trusting in God’s leading and picking one key with a confidence from Him.

5.  Besides your home, vehicle, and special jewelry, what is something you keep under lock and key?

My classroom supplies are under lock and key!!  Things like pens, post-it notes, and paper go “missing” if I don’t keep them locked away and are expensive to replenish!

6.  When did you last get keyed up about something?

Funny you should ask.

I last got keyed up yesterday after the SAME telemarketer called me a SECOND time in less than two hours.  The first time the person called, I was SLEEPING.  The second time, I was armed with a plan.  I answered the phone and instructed him to take me off his call list…even informing him that I was on the Do Not Call registry.  He proceeded to try to tell me he wasn’t selling anything, to which I repeated my request to take me off his list.  He insisted that the call wouldn’t take long, and I completely lost it and YELLED at him to take me off his list.

My dogs wouldn’t even go near me.  I guess I sounded mad.

The guy?

He hung up on me and never called back.

I’m on a mission to eradicate these stupid telemarketers from my life.  They will rue the day they call my house.  AuburnChick is finished playing nice.  🙂

7.  Who thinks we need an easy one right about now?  Key lime pie…yes please or no thank you?

I love Key Lime Pie and simply must find a vegan version of it.  I think I might have one…I’ve just been too lazy to cook anything this summer.

8.  My Random Thought

So, the Mr. and I have a social event to attend this weekend.

One of Chicky’s high school friends is getting married.  We attend the same church, and I’ve always thought a lot of this beautiful young lady.  She’s a gem, let me tell you, with beauty that stems from her heart.

I’ve been struggling with what to wear because I don’t exactly exude social graces.

One of my Ravelry friends saw the dress in the following picture and assured me that it would be perfect for the afternoon wedding.

By the way, I got the dress at Kohl’s last Sunday.

My friend suggested I pair it with red shoes for “pop.”

Meanwhile, my legs…oh my legs…they are so white.  I’ll spare you a picture of them.

I went to Walmart a couple of days ago and picked up some lotion to help.  I don’t do tanning beds, and I also don’t sunbathe.  I’d rather not get skin cancer, thank you very much.

Here’s Day 1…

I’m curious if the lotion I bought will make a difference.

Here’s Day 2…

So, I’ll spend the rest of the week shopping for a cute pair of red shoes and, possibly, a little red clutch to carry my cell phone in.

What are your thoughts?

Filed under: This-n-That | Tagged: | 1 Comment »

Dear Jennifer Brown

Posted on August 4, 2014 by auburnchick

Dear Jennifer Brown,

I just finished reading Perfect Escape, the third of a set of your books I brought home from my classroom.  I had already read Hate List over a year ago.

I want to thank you for writing books that take on challenging topics.

Do you write dystopian novels filled with plagues and zombies?

Nope.

Do you write stories filled with government conspiracies?

Nope.

You create characters with honest-to-goodness believable problems that each and every reader can relate to.

Your characters could be our friends, family members, or people on the news.

You’re not afraid to embroil your characters in real-world issues such as bullying, sexting, dating violence, cheating, and mental illness.

Your characters come to life in their raw musings, sometimes aloud but often in their heads.

They think what we think, and they aren’t afraid to think them.

They finally lose their cool and explode, saying out loud what we often don’t have the courage to say.

In doing so, this frees us up from the guilt of shame…shame for feeling the way we do…because someone else feels the same way.

Thank you for writing books that my high school students relate to.

I’ve seen them cry over your books and have, personally, cried over the books as well.

I’ve been told, by a student, that she got in trouble at home…for READING TOO MUCH.

I thank you for this, for she was reading one of the books pictured above.

Now, I’m not going to fault those who write about zombies and the apocalypse.  There’s an audience for those books.  I’m part of that audience, because I enjoy reading a variety of books so I can knowledgeably pair them up with my students’ interests.

But…

Your books hit home with my students…especially the female ones…in a way that other books do not.

Many do not have mamas at home they can confide in or, in true teenage fashion, do not feel comfortable talking to.

Your voice, through your characters, tells my students that it’s okay to feel angst and shame over what some might downplay as typical teenage stuff.

Thank you for not trivializing the issues.

You’ve played a large role in helping me create engage readers…hopefully life-long readers.

Your friend and fangirl,

Nathalie

Filed under: Books, Teaching | Tagged: , , | Leave a comment »

The Beauty of Imperfection

Posted on August 3, 2014 by auburnchick

I’m currently about two-thirds of the way through Perfect Escape by one of my favorite young adult writers, Jennifer Brown.

This book tells the story of Kendra, a high school senior, who whisks her brother, Grayson, away on a road trip.

It’s no ordinary road trip, though, because Kendra is running away from trouble at school.

She tries to justify the trip in her mind by claiming that she’s on a mission to help her brother, who is mentally ill because of his OCD.

One of the things Grayson does when he’s under stress is to line up rocks and count them.

Rocks are his fascination, and I was struck by a comment he made to Rena, a young mom who joins in on their road trip.

She asks Grayson why a particular piece of quartz is colorless while other pieces have various colors.

He explains that pure quartz is colorless, and that is is chemical imperfections that leads to quartz becoming colored.

Then he says, “Quartz is at its most beautiful when it’s been changed by impurities.”

Go ahead and re-read it.  I bolded it because it’s a very poignant statement.

I had to pause in my reading, so I’m not sure how the author is going to use this statement of his.

I sure can see deep meaning in this sentence.

The first thing I thought about was my students.

They are certainly not perfect (none of us are).

Their lives are dirtied up by terribly dysfunctional home lives, terrible personal choices, and temptations to make more poor decisions.

These are the students who walk into my classroom.

These are the things that make them beautiful in my eyes.

These are my favorites precisely because of their imperfections.

I find even deeper meaning in Grayson’s words, though, by thinking about our lives as sinners.

Boy are we imperfect, aren’t we?

In God’s eyes, though, we are beautiful and worthy of His love.

He sent Jesus, His Son, to die for imperfect beings.

How humbling is that?!

I think back to when the Mr. proposed to me and gave me my engagement ring.

I was in college and enrolled in a science class that had a lab.  One lab day, we had to work with the microscopes, and I put my ring beneath the viewer.  We marveled because the diamond was nearly flawless.

I wonder how many people purposely select diamonds with flaws?

Not many.  There’s an entire rating scale devoted to a diamond’s qualities, and big sales are made over the best gems.

When you look at Grayson’s statement again, you notice that he says that quartz is beautiful because it’s been changed by imperfections.

If you think about it, our imperfections make us who we are.  They add color to our lives.

What an interesting concept and such a neat way of looking at and accepting my own imperfections…something that’s very tough for a perfectionist like myself.

I am beautiful…

Because of my imperfections.

Filed under: Books, Christian | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a comment »

A Little Bit of Progress

Posted on August 1, 2014 by auburnchick

Is it really August 1st?

Yesterday, I went into my classroom to try to finish up some cleaning after picking up school supplies from Walmart and Office Depot…

My goal was to clean all of the tabletops as well as my desk so that next week, I can go in and tape my Kagan mats to the tables.  I have learned that the tape won’t stick if I don’t let the cleaning products disappear fully.  Weird, I know, but there’s something like a film that’s left after I clean tables.

I also got out my lamps and other things…paper clips, notebooks, etc. and started setting up some of my tables.  I was pleased and took a panoramic…

Click to view larger image

I’d purchased a new lamp from Walmart a couple of days before.  There was one corner of my room that wasn’t well lit when I turned off the lights for videos.  With that rectified, I took another panoramic photo…

Click to embiggen

The progress is slow, but I am pleased.  Once I have the physical space set up, I can focus on tweaking my syllabi and other first-week-of-school handouts.  I also need to begin lesson planning.  My goal is to have two weeks of lesson plans finished before I go for pre-planning.

It’s slow going, but since I’m working on my own volition, I’d consider the progress quite good.  Not being in a panic, as I’ve tended to do over the years, is refreshing and means I won’t be worn out completely when I have to settle down and do the hard thinking that’s required for my lessons.

Filed under: Teaching | Tagged: , , | 1 Comment »

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