SERIOUSLY

IF I SEE ONE COMMERCIAL FOR A CLEANING PRODUCT OR LOW FAT CHOCOLATE FOOD THAT DOESN'T MAKE ME WANT TO THROW UP FROM THE BLATANT DISPLAY OF MISOGYNY I WILL DIE OF SHOCK. FUCK YOU ADVERTISING.

just when..

you think you know something, life turns around and smacks you in the face and reminds you that you don't. i don't really believe in karma and whenever people reference karmic retribution it seems to be less an understanding of cosmic intervention and more a helpless, vengeful appeal for their lost face, i.e. "karma will take care of it" -> "things better work out for me but not for that person whose life choices i don't agree with! because i'm pissed!" usually when people mention karma it is in a negative sense.

so i came back from a really lovely getaway with megan last weekend (see previous post) and i felt so happy while i was away with her that when i got back i couldn't help but feel a little dispirited. i love my life on a day to day basis - i have a loving boyfriend who stimulates my brain and my heart, i adore my family, i make enough money, there will always be a book to read, etc etc, but everything seemed a hint lackluster in comparison to a weekend of no work, no stress, no impending future, especially coming back to my job. i honestly couldn't tell you if i enjoy my job. i'm here right now, as it were, and i can say i enjoy being paid to sit and blog, but i go back and forth concerning the rest. teaching is positive for me in a selfish sense; i have learned so much more than i feel i have taught. not in the sense that i needed an immense amount of help with my multiplication tables or pronoun usage, but connecting with a person and feeling them understand something can be a really rewarding experience. again, this is me i'm primarily focusing on, but i suppose it works for the student as well.

so this tuesday i go into work and i am seriously dreading it in a way that i never have. i teach mostly SAT/ACT preparation, and although the work is often challenging, it has become exquisitely repetitive to teach and reteach the exact same concepts over and over and over again, and i sincerely fear that it is a detriment to my ability to communicate with newer students, as the words coming out of my mouth about parallelism or substitution could be repeated in my sleep. they seem to have lost meaning and i try so hard to pretend it's the first time i'm learning them, to anticipate the questions i'd have and to address them, but i've become so fucking familiar with the material i worry that i just can't. all this is going through my head as well as the thousand complaints i have about the way my work treats education (which i'm pretty sure i can't legally describe here...hmm) and how much i would change if it were up to me which of course it will never be, and i walk through my door and see on the schedule that i have a new student. i'm looking for their SAT binder but realize that this little nugget is only 6 years old! i haven't worked with a younger kid in months, and the change alone is welcome. it's less stressful and they tend to be more excited to be there; they're not taking 4 AP classes and worried about their cheerleading practice/6 hours of homework/boyfriend/getting into harvard at the age of 15. real talk high school is crazy these days. i always thought it was tougher than college, but maybe that's because i gave up in high school and conceded that it was total bullshit. i haven't necessarily conceded that i don't believe that anymore...anyway.

so this little man comes in named aaron and we spend two hours learning; we do exercises with phonics, the alphabet, discerning the main idea of pictures and stories, reading, writing, various math activities. sometimes when i'm working with these kids it's mostly daycare, i give them snacks, guide them through, etc. but sometimes i catch myself in the middle of a lesson and realize how critical this is to a child's development: this little boy is at this moment learning how to read. he's recognizing sounds, he's blending letters together, he's forming letters into words into sentences, his little cogs are moving and he is truly learning. how. to. read. is there anything more important than knowing how to read? is there any one single thing that can open more doors, more avenues to remote thoughts and concepts than reading? this is going to be something that affects the rest of his life, and here he is sitting at this tiny desk, literally learning before my eyes. it's pretty amazing to watch someone learn, and for all the teaching i've done i can't say it's common to see. to really really see someone learn something new and hold on to it is rare, because learning is so complicated and happens over time and sometimes isn't truly learned and solidified for years and years until that one magical moment. and what i was doing on that dreadful monday was helping this little boy along to a magical moment.

can you remember a time before you could read? i can't, i don't think i'd ever want to. so all this strikes me just when i'm getting kind of hopeless and thinking my job sucks and i've gotten everything out of it that i can. karma, bitch!

the bell jar

is killing me! so great.

egg and cheese

i am loath to say that i'm currently sitting in a panera - it's not my fault, people! dan had to work this morning and since we are carpool-ers i decided to wait around this banana stand and pretend to "do work" on my computer. what this means is to watch project runway while uploading pictures and reminiscing from a really amazing, invigorating weekend in new york. here's a play by play :

friday: drive up to DC, hang out with my daddio y mamacita, meet megan, drink sangria in chinatown, wait an extra hour for the bus, get yelled at by the seriously abrasive proprietors of the bus, hurry onto the bus, doze while sharing leonard cohen on the ipod, brave the disgusting hole in the floor they refer to as the toilet, which is located in inky darkness and is not equipped with toilet paper or a locking door, get walked in on by a fellow bus rider while hovering above said hole and clinging to the handicapped handle for dear life while truck drivers catch glimpses of my bare bottom through the uncurtained window, FINALLY get to manhattan, meet jonny, drink delicious pickle-tini and eat yummy veg dumplings at bar nearby where there is a single gogo dancer, get in cab, go to apartment in brooklyn, drink rolling rock, talk about immigration/welfare/who the fuck knows, feel bad for andrew for having to get up to go to work in 4 hours, pass out

saturday: wake up with horrible pain from lack of pillow, suspect heart attack, take advil, venture out, walk walk walk walk see parks, trees, people, teeny dogs, children, books, clothes, cheese shop, end up at the five leaves, wait wait, drink perfect iced coffee, sit at bar, tiny pickle in my bloody mary, 3 hour long meal nom nom nom nom fried tomatoes, walk walk walk, dead rat, waterfront, strange smells, big grass, conversations about heinous crimes, baby in tutu, pumpkin pie ice cream, old books, nude afro-d barbara streisand record, children's stories, youtube videos, COMPLETE DOUBLE RAINBOW, walk walk, bar, wine, chug wine, pizzzzzzzaaaaaa, dimmed lighting, wine, cab, traffic, paul! queen vic, jager bombs, british flag, gay bar, too many people, kgb, walk walk, cab, bridge, drunk, home, sleep, pillow

sunday: good morning! showerrrrrr, took too long to get ready, nutella bagel but NO SMOOTHIES, get on the train for the first time, get off the train, get on the train, get off the train, brooklyn museum! pornographic statue, student discount, art art art, slippery floors, rhinestones, vaginas! leave into the crisp air, walk, park, squirrels, dogs, kites, soccer, volleyball, legs tired, INDIAN FOOD, dosa! thin flaky buttery lentil pancake in my belly, crowded cafeteria, laughing laughing laughing, walk walk, back to brooklyn, the knitting factory, hilarious, hipster bar, sleeeeepy, couch, sleep.

monday: depressed! last day :( we carry our ludicrously heavy bags around, eat mozzarella basil tomato pesto sandwich, people watch, drudge up the stairs, down the stairs, people watch in chinatown, wait for bus, sit on bus, traffic on bus, try to sleep on bus, get off bus, get on metro, get off metro, get on shuttle bus, get on metro, get off metro, get in cab, goodbye megan! get in car, get out of car, put oil in car, get in car, drive home, get home. bed. dan. mmmmm.

everything besides the traveling aspect of this weekend was truly perfect. the perfect little getaway and we managed to not lose our savings in the process. i love new york!

off with your head

dance dance til you're dead.

I really love the Yeah Yeah Yeah's. Even It's Blitz, which is on the verge of TOO DANCEY (if there is such a thing), has some gems. Part of this is sentimental; I used to listen to Fever to Tell back in the day with my girls driving fast down the dark streets of the suburbs, looking at the stars, smoking cigarettes, waiting for something to do, not realizing it was already happening.

I should be doing work right now! I refuse to ramble further!

FRIGHT FEST

So today started out like most Sundays, albeit I was a little more hungover than usual because there was a big hoo-ha over in Oregon Hill that left me worse for the wear. Anyway, we woke up, lazed around and decided we wanted to go out in the crisp air for some food at Joe's Inn because we may be too lazy to cook but not too lazy to walk to get some good ass potatoes. Then I get a call from Megan telling me that she somehow has two free tickets to Kings Dominion that have to be used today and is headed there with Justin right now. The weather was looking pretty icky but we decided to brave it and went out there to meet them after we ate. It was just bizarre to spontaneously leave for Kings Dominion having no plan whatsoever and no expectations, but it ended up being a really fun day. There were no lines, it wasn't a hundred and ten degrees outside, we rode all the good roller coasters over and over, but what I wasn't prepared for was the FRIGHT. Or, as they call it now, "Halloween Haunt" or some stupid shit, I guess it changes every year. We read the map of all the 'scary' attractions they have and decide to go into this totally un-ironically haunted "slaughterhouse" where the terror is that they're really EATING PEOPLE. I mean normally it's animals that they are slaughtering for food but I guess that's a-ok. Regardless! I was not prepared for how fucking terrified I was of this attraction. We walk in and there's a corridor with all this fake hanging meat and then all of a sudden people dressed like deranged butchers with horrifying monster masks start jumping out at us as we walk through the winding halls, and it FREAKED ME OUT SO BAD. I was on the verge of tears by the time we got out of there because they sensed my fear and honed in on me while I clutched Dan's jacket like a 5 year old. The element of suspense, the fact that they're all wielding cleavers, I don't know what it was that turned me from a rational adult who knows that these are humorously nonthreatening amusement park workers wearing masks to someone who truly believed that she was about to be cut up and served to a bunch of pigs (because wouldn't THAT be ironic)! After we got out of there I refused to participate in any further spooky activities, including Club Blood (vampires) and ASYLUM (duh). But even if you didn't want to partake in the sectioned off scare-zones, there were still gobs of scary actors dressed up like demented clowns or undead pilgrims milling around who SMELLED the fact that they could get a high-pitched squeal out of me. When did I become such a baby?! This has really put me on high alert because if I didn't know this about myself what else could there be lurking in my subconscious just waiting to ooze out at the most inopportune moment? What if I'm terrified of a certain breed of dog or completely enamored by sting rays? WHO KNOWS ANYMORE?!?

Oh well, here I am on the merry-go-round :)

I'm back!

So today is the day I start blogging again for real. I just got home from mentoring and it's beautiful outside, I'm in a good mood, I don't have to go to work at Huntington and wheeeeee all is well in the world. Forget that I have to man the center tomorrow while three thousand kids come in for various reasons, teachers invariably are late or don't show, parents ask inane questions while timers scream at me at 5 minute intervals, everyone wants to take a snack break at the same time and I can't stop questioning the appropriateness of my top. Seriously, who invented professional attire?

Ok, enough negativity. It truly is intoxicatingly (yep that's not a word) nice outside and I had such a good mentoring session today with Marissa. We played Scrabble, drew pictures, played tic-tac-toe and all the while had an impressively easy conversation. She is almost painfully shy and demure so I occasionally found myself hurling a spate of questions at her and had to stop, but she really opened up (relatively) today and we even had a few laughs, mainly at the squashed, preschool-esque butterfly I drew for her.

So at the risk of giving up on this post because there are so many distractions going on around me right now, I will end it here and accept the fact that if this is going to be a daily activity, my blog doesn't have to include every single aspect of my life. WHEW.