Appreciating the Details

Reluctant Surrender

2012-01-25T20:15:00.000-09:00

Taken while out of town a couple months ago...an option I wish we had right about now.

Yesterday, I was overwhelmed.

In a world that I try to keep as organized as possible, I began to lose control. Meetings that needed to take place didn't. Students that needed to be disciplined weren't. Nights that Curtis should have off were taken. And as I lay in bed trying to coordinate with often-absent husband what our plan for the rest of the week was, I began to feel despondent.

There was no joy in the quiet of the evening; there was only frustration with what should be and isn't.

I often wait for morning with hopefulness that some cure-all-magic came in the night and wiped the slate clean: anxiety, frustration, desperation--be gone. But this morning the magic was no where to be found. I lingered in bed for an extra fifteen minutes, hoping that the moments of calm might make up for the gloomy reality check that was sure to follow the instant I started my day. It didn't. The gloom followed me as I washed my face, packed my lunch, made my tea, and drove to work, where I found out I was late for a meeting I had forgotten about.

In what should no longer be a surprising trend, I often find myself soothed by the rhythm of the day once it has started: taking attendance, executing a lesson, circling and weaving throughout the desks endlessly as I surveil students distracted or distraught, trying to prevent issues before they come to pass. By lunch time I may not have been satisfied with my plight, but it no longer weighed on me with a distracting force. I was doing what I could with my situation; I could not control the actions of those around, no matter how frustrated I was.

By the end of the day, one situation was resolved for the time being, and the rest still hung as they had in the heat of my frustration last night. But even though my situation hardly changed, I had made peace with the situation, acknowledging that I had done all that I could with what I had control over. At the end of the day, it doesn't feel like much is mine to decide.

Perhaps that is the better place to be.

Distraction, Delay, and Temptations Outside

2012-01-24T18:41:00.000-09:00

A couple of calves and a mother moose hanging out by our cars a couple weeks ago...

The chill subsided yesterday, granting one glorious day of above ten degree temperature not accompanied by a dumping of snow. I packed my skis in the morning, hopeful that the morning snow would cease by afternoon.

And it did.

But not before we had three fire drills, thanks to a faulty system where one intentional drill turns into two more unintentional alarms that must be obeyed even though we are quite sure they are futile. Though I stood with students and co-workers out in the snow in a skirt and tights, my honest thought was still, "It's warm out here; what a great day for a fire drill."

The glide of my skis on the trails an hour later was a welcome feeling, especially when coupled with solitude and quiet. The hills strained my lungs, but the glow of the 4:30 sunset was gorgeous: a clear day with bearable temperatures, and groomed trails just a few miles from my house. I declared to Curtis later in the evening that if or when we move away, I will miss afternoons like this.

Today I was ready for round two: just me, my skis and quiet afternoon trails. Unfortunately the sun betrayed us again today, and the clear skies left temperatures in the single digits, with a wind chill that knocked them below zero. It is hard to pick your poison on days like today: frozen fingers that ache once warmed and swell for the rest of the night? Or yet another day in the germ-infested gym, surrounded by anonymous patrons, entrenched in the clanking of weights and whirls of treadmills?

Today I chose abused fingers, aching joints, a splotchy face and a slow glide that comes with the sharpening of cold crystals. Ten minutes into a friction-full ski, I rounded a corner to find a nice tall moose chomping on the local foliage. I stood for a few minutes and waited for her to move, given that she was almost completely blocking the trail. Eventually a nice old lady caught up to where I stood, and when she saw that we may wait for quite a while for the trail to clear, we agreed that our fingers were already frozen, and I confessed to her that what I really wanted at the moment was a hot bath. (We also noted that given the latest local moose story, we were unprepared without a shovel for protection.) One shortcut through fresh powder in the woods later and we made our way back on the trail circling back to the parking lot.

Given the same conditions tomorrow, I'm not sure what I would choose. The glow of the mountains and the promise of fresh snow is hard to refuse, even with the expected discomfort. I guess the truth is at the end of the day all bets are off; even with a poor weather report I cannot promise that I won't venture out with my best mittens resigned to collecting a deep chill.

After all, it's nothing a hot bath can't fix.

January Dreamer

2012-01-20T14:17:00.000-09:00

The chill continues.

Last week's blizzard plummeted quickly into a freeze, and we haven't crept much above zero since then. It's been -15 on average at our house, and though Curtis continues to bike to work without much complaint, even short jaunts outside seem to chill me to the core. Every afternoon I check the weather online, comparing the predicted high for the day against the actual afternoon temperature, disappointed once again to see that though we were supposed to hit 3 or 6 or 10 (!), we instead hovered at -1 (feels like -1,000).

Yesterday after work I spent just a few minutes in the cold--enough to gather emptied garbage cans and attach the bike rack to our hitch--and by the time I got inside I walked straight to the tub to draw a bath. A twenty minute soak is just enough to take the edge off a chill that often continues all evening.

I am craving a good ski these days. The sunny, clear skies and glowing mountains are so inviting--until you see the temperature. As the announcement went out at the end of yesterday's school day that cross
country ski practice would be inside--yet again--I groaned on their behalf. I'm not sure which is worse: skiing in temperatures below zero, or running the halls instead.

The good news, I suppose, is that I seem to be talented at keeping myself occupied indoors. When the laundry and cleaning is done, I find myself enrolled in yet another class for the quarter. Curtis was not overly surprised to find out that I was picking up another few credits, but I find myself increasingly convinced that the role of student is one of my favorites. The moment I feel I have conquered a task or subject, I get bored. I am always looking for new books, new recipes, new lessons and classes to teach and take. Sometimes I feel myself growing weary of teaching a single grade instead of multiple grades like I used to. One thing is for sure, I won't be the teacher that teaches the same thing forever--it's just not in me to do so.

And I suppose that this is a typical January reflection: growing tired of the cold, though still enjoying skiing; growing weary of the school year and keeping an eye out for that which is fresh and original; huddling up inside with quiet activities, while keeping an eye out for hints of spring and plans for summer.

January is a dreamer's month: it's important to remember where we are headed so as not to get bogged down in where we seem to be stuck.

Final Reading of 2011

2012-01-13T10:30:00.000-09:00

I have been trying to put this list together to finish off my 2011 reads even as I already have three books on my 2012 list. I have found I really enjoy having a record of what I am reading, especially as an English teacher when I feel like I am constantly referencing books.

Young adult literature was mixed in this fall with reading I was completing for a class on teaching writing. While the YA lit was undoubtedly more in the "page turner" category, the professional development reading was interesting and helpful in many ways.

Young Adult Reading:

Ashes was a book I picked up because students were reading it, interested in the historical World War II setting. This award winner features an interesting mix of fictional and non-fiction characters, and the reader inevitably learns a lot about pre-war Germany, the indoctrination happening within the schools, and the choices non-Jews had to make about what they were willing to live with. It ends before the war even begins, but showcases how that time period undoubtedly changed the German teens coming-of-age in a controversial era. Overall, I loved the many literary references (Jack London, Ernest Hemmingway, Mark Twain) and the way the author wove quotes from these authors in as commentary on the events.

The Maze Runner was the new young adult series that caught my eye this winter. Picked up by several of my students, I packed it in my bag when I returned to rural Alaska for the weekend to visit a friend of mine. I finished it in 48 hours and could hardly wait to pick up book two (The Scorch Trials) from the librarian before Christmas break. I finished book two to cap off 2011, and have since started book three (The Death Cure). This series starts in a Lord of the Flies sort of scenario: a group of teenagers struggling to survive while creating a community without the authority or guidance of adults. They face many unique challenges including green, blob-like grievers that live in a maze that the teens need to solve in order to escape this other world. While this first book is my favorite so far, the series is engaging and raises interesting questions about loyalty and whether the ends justify the means.

Chains was a book I picked up as the summer ended after it was announced as a school-wide book to read. While the participation in the reading didn't elicit as much participation as we hoped for, I still enjoyed reading it. Two sisters are sold as slaves even though their masters made arrangements for them to be free when she died. They end up in the midst of the revolutionary war in Philadelphia, and have to choose where their loyalty lies: The patriots of the city? Or the loyalists they serve at home?

Professional Reading

This was one of two books I read for a writing class I took this fall. The class was rigorous and I spent many hours every week reading articles, writing responses and reflecting on how to apply the lessons I was learning in the classroom. It was by far one of the most beneficial classes I have taken since becoming a teacher.

This was the other text used for the class. It was a bit longer and more "text book" feeling, but still full of great information.

A Long Engagement...

2012-01-12T15:19:00.001-09:00

Last year's Anniversary card, purchased after finding this gem for Mother's Day...

I started shopping for Valentine's Day cards yesterday afternoon, perusing Etsy looking for crafty inspiration to represent my "undying love and affection" for my husband. When I told my sister this while we worked out on neighboring eliptical machines, she exclaimed, "But you always make your cards!"

She is traditionally correct, but when last year's Mother's Day find led to the discovery of the perfect medical-themed-anniversary card, I thought I'd pick other crafty creative brains to see if they were full of inspiration I was lacking. Note: I haven't found anything yet, but the search continues...

While making an evening run to Costco this past Monday night, Curtis and I ended up trying to remember what we have done for every anniversary. We realized that this year's celebration will most likely be out of town due to the schedule of his rotations, but given that we have celebrated no two years in the same place (or on the same day for that matter), it just means searching out worthwhile options when the opportunity presents itself.

Today, on the anniversary of our engagement, I have decided to record our anniversaries past, because every circumstance had a story:

Year 1: We celebrated while visiting Alaska, for the first and only time on our exact date, by driving out of town to a restaurant in a small town with a cult following. While I had been there before (deeming it the location of the best-steak-of-my-life), it was Curtis's first visit, and he was not disappointed. We took pictures in front of the cloudy inlet on the way home, and returned to turn in early because even though I was off for summer break, Curtis was not. He was eagerly trying to put his best face forward; this was the location a potential residency, after all.

Year 2: This year we scheduled our celebration a full month following our actual anniversary. Thanks to both board studying and an unmerciful OB rotation, the actual two-year anniversary was celebrated with a twenty minute dinner of baked salmon and salad, with a promise to celebrate properly when time allowed. At the appointed time we used a gift certificate won in a drawing to head out of town to our favorite Amish inn, with lots of surrounding area to walk, a large porch with a swing, and an incredible breakfast the next morning. It was delightful.

Year 3: Though only eighteen months ago, this was the year we had the most difficulty remembering. This is unsurprising, since the day fell one week after Curtis began residency and two weeks after I arrived to start moving in/job searching/starting a new life. It was chaotic and a couple days late, but we found an evening to go out for dinner downtown, and spent it making plans. Time to dream and plan was short in supply those days, with me making decisions while Curtis slaved away at the hospital, but that was one occasion where carving out time to just be together felt like gold. It is fun to remember how much our lives would clarify after that point: a week later I would interview for a job, two weeks later I would have a contract, three weeks later I would tour and eventually make an offer on the condo we came to own(while Curtis would see it only shortly before closing), and five weeks later (on my birthday) an offer would be accepted.

Year 4: This past year we celebrated early, thanks to the trip to rural Alaska which would find us separate on the actual date. My sister dolled me up and took photos of us to celebrate, and then we went out to a quiet dinner at a local place known for spectacular seafood. We followed it up with a trip downtown to walk around in the lingering summer sunshine, appreciating our time together which had been pretty sparse in the midst of Curtis's traveling rotations.

Year 5 will find us out of town, location to be determined, and I find myself already excited for a specially planned date--a welcome break from whatever chaos we are in the midst of at that point. Today that is a welcome idea, as I find myself wishing Curtis wasn't on call five of seven days this week, and that our free time was more abundant to enjoy each other and the generous amount of snow we are getting.

Yes, today is the anniversary of our engagement, and though it is not a date we typically celebrate, I am finding myself nostalgic. It's hard to believe that we've been married for almost five years, but much harder to imagine living apart.

A Year of Patience

2012-01-10T18:08:00.000-09:00

Taken on New Year's Eve...

2011 was a year of settling in and adjusting. Though the year started six months in to Curtis's new job and our cross country move, it felt in some ways like it took us that long to hit our stride: our relationships with those around us deepened, the rhythm needed to match our often-conflicting schedules was established, and we made our condo more of a home.

At some point this summer, I realized that 2011's theme was and would be patience. Perhaps it was the product of settling in to our new life, which inevitably loses the honeymoon glow. Perhaps it's that this year is "in the middle"--not the beginning of Curtis's training, but not the end either. Perhaps it's the reality that my group of students this year held a different set of challenges. Whatever the reason, that will be the quality I remember from this time in my life: learning to be content, learning to appreciate qualities and circumstances that clash with my inclinations, remembering that patience is a fruit of the spirit, and not something I can cultivate with my own sheer will power.

Even though these challenges did not dissipate with the fireworks we watched on New Year's early morning, I look forward to turning the calendar just the same. A new year, even one that happens in the midst of so many commitments already in motion, feels fresh.

Hazy and Overdramatic Ramblings on MLA

2012-01-04T16:36:00.000-09:00

The trees wear gloves of frost these days, iced over with the frigid temperatures that have settled in the area. I was shocked to see my thermometer read double digits when I climbed in after school, and fully expected the impending drop as the number corrected on the drive home.

While above zero temperatures make skiing in the waning sunlight more than fair game, I find myself in bed. It was a bit premature for me to reflectively note on Monday that I'd made it through Christmas break without getting sick--apparently I just waited until the last day to do it. My head has felt foggy for the past two days, making the instruction of Bibliographies and source citations even more challenging than normal. One student in particular, who has made it known on more than one occasion that he loathes rules that don't serve a very distinct purpose to protect one from harm, found particular issues with the conventions of MLA. At some point during the period I convinced him that he could conquer the rules in creating his bibliography masterpiece, but I don't remember how.

Despite my hazy memory of today's events, I do very clearly remember repeating the same phrases over and over again: "Don't forget to capitalize that." or "The period after______ isn't optional." I also remember literally leaning to the side when a student didn't know what it meant to italicize something. After all, sometimes verbal explanations don't quite cut it.

I left my desk this afternoon with substitute plans marginally created, should this cold double down on me overnight. After all, MLA has gotten the better of me when I was in great health and adequately energized. Trying to teach teenagers that balk at details like bringing pencils to class about the necessary commas and colons while I am sick? It could be the end of me.

Hazy Memories of Break, Which Now Feels Miles Away

2012-01-04T07:42:00.000-09:00

This morning came early, with my mind awake and swirling literally hours before my alarm was actually scheduled to go off. Perhaps the charm and nerves of the first day of school never quite dispel, no matter how many years (23) one has been attending...

Today I feel tired. It could have been the early morning, though I fear it has more to do with symptoms of brewing illness I detected as I turned over in the middle of the night. How lame is it to call in sick after two weeks off? I guess I may find out, depending on how these germs play out...

This weekend was simply wonderful. After a full week of work for Curtis, we packed up the Subaru (almost to the brim) and joined my family out at the lake. An hour and a half out of town is the perfect amount I have decided: too far to drive back for anything; close enough to leave at 8:30pm if that is what work requires. After unloading skis and games and hot cocoa and books and all the supplies needed to construct and sleep in a snow cave, we crashed for the night, ever aware of how the temperature (well below zero) would affect our activities.

Turns out that a house full of people raised in Alaska (plus one transplant that is currently dating my sister) makes for many a trip outdoors, even if it's -25. We explored the local trails on snow machines, ever aware of frozen fingers but taking in the glittering branches and vibrant sky around every corner. Curtis determined it to be a perfect weekend to sleep in a snow cave (what better way to ring in the new year?), and along with my brother and my sister's beau, mounded, hallowed out and crusted a spectacular snow cave. Perhaps the most entertaining part of this year's cave was that Curtis was determined to impress me with new and improved snow-cave-engineering. When I scouted it out around 10pm New Year's Eve, I was impressed with both the shortened entry tunnel, the raised ceiling, and the warmth inside. There had to be at least a 50 degree improvement. Curtis still hopes that I'll join him in his snow cave at next year's winter-survival-extravaganza. The jury is still out on that one.

After a full weekend of activities, we were ready to head back to civilization, and unfortunately found ourselves with a vehicle that wouldn't start. While we reminisced about what a regular occurrence this was last January, we huffed and puffed and pushed the car into the garage to warm up, aided by some "Heat" in the gas tank. Two games of Eucre later, we managed to bring the car to life, and headed home about three hours behind schedule.

Sitting at my desk with a calendar empty of finalized lesson plans and bins empty of graded papers, I find myself still feeling very full. This break felt a bit more "normal" than usual due to Curtis's work, but the time we managed to steal away with family and each other was a gift. Though I would have traded all my presents for two weeks off with him, but I'll happily take two weekends.

No Time to Spare

2011-12-29T21:43:00.002-09:00

I always think I'm going to have more time when I finish school for the quarter and am rewarded with a break. I will paint, and clean, and organize. I will cook, and bake, and read. I will ski, and write, and accomplish all the tasks I don't have time to fit in when I am teaching.

And then the break begins.

I start with good intentions, and often maintain a fairly productive pace--motivated by the momentum of the finishing semester. Then, I realize how much time I have. Two weeks is plenty of time to paint the kitchen, read four books, and complete the mending that has been stacked by my dresser since...August. Then, I fill my time with tasks not on my list, mainly cooking, meeting Curtis for lunch, playing with my friend's children, and collecting large balloon arrangements downtown. Then, I find that my break is over and the only mending I did was the hem on a pair of pants I needed to actually wear. That sock that I am too cheap to throw away with one small hole in it? Still sitting in the mending pile, needing ten minutes of attention that I can never seem to spare.

I suppose I should be used to this cycle by now, relegating my list to a few key to-do tasks and leaving the rest of my break to the whim of a relaxed schedule.

With the exception of less than 72 hours out on the island to visit Curtis's family, we've been pretty set in town this year. Curtis had to work almost all of the break, and I was content to put off much Christmas shopping, all decorating and wrapping, and plenty of other activities knowing that I could accomplish them "over break".

Turns out that I would have gotten just as much done if we'd just headed out of town for a week...but where's the fun in that?

Christmas Break Reflections: (Insert clever title here)

2011-12-22T15:18:00.000-09:00

At times we speak of "coming down" at our house, that point in time after a dramatic event when you are still worked up from completing a challenging task--even though it is over. As a child this seemed to happen most often post-Christmas or birthdays, as a high school student it surely happened at the end of the semesters or after a season ended, in college post-final and post-national competetion let downs were dreaded, and seemed to often be coupled with an inevitable illness.

Despite the less extreme build ups that happen as adults with (semi) normal jobs, those let downs still happen, and Curtis and I do our best to try and plan distractions to lessen the blow. We know (from experience) that after a board exam or a 30-hour shift or a day packed with grading end-of-the-semester projects all we think we want to do is sit on the couch...but often what we really need to do is get out.

Friday night I found myself on a date with one of my best girlfriends: the one I have known since eighth grade, the one who lets me spend the night at her house when Curtis works nights for weeks at a time, the one whose kids excitedly cry "Ash!" whenever I come over. When I moved back to Alaska a year and a half ago I was so sad to leave a supportive community of people behind, but I shouldn't have been surprised to find friendships waiting for me the moment I stepped off the plane, friendships that perhaps had been dormant for a while, but ready to come back to life now that distance was no concern.

She and I went out for a nice dinner Friday night, our prearranged Christmas gift for each other, and talked and laughed and caught up on weeks of events that have been left unshared due to trips out of town, and finishing semesters, and everything else since Thanksgiving. Then, just as the evening seemed to be winding down as we walked the chilly streets downtown a stranger offered us a bouquet of balloons. This is where it becomes apparent that my friend and I are very different people. I took one look at this collection of no less than three dozen red and green balloons and chuckled, prepared to continue our chilly walk to the car. She didn't miss a beat and exclaimed an enthusiastic YES, and began prancing down one of the busiest streets downtown like she had just won the lottery. "This is amazing!" she cried while laughing, attracting the attention of all the Christmas crowds downtown on a Friday night. And I chuckled as I followed behind, wind blowing the massive collection in front and behind us, distracting traffic, making our already fun evening into a memory.

After ten minutes of her pulling and me pushing the massive collection of balloons into her SUV, jostling them around four carseats, a pair of skis and poles that popped at least one balloon on the way home, we managed to fit all but five in the vehicle for the drive back to her house. I drove behind her on roads that were slick, and we trecked several miles across town hovering under forty miles per hour, the speed at which the exposed balloons seemed destined to break free. By the time we had unloaded them at her house, two of four children came downstairs awake to see about this commotion. They were wide eyed with surprise over this massive balloon collection, a Christmas miracle for sure. An hour later when I headed home, I declared to the silence of my vehicle that let-down-day distraction was a success. The conclusion of teaching/coaching/grading/learning for 2011 had been marked with dinner out and one large bouquet of balloons that still hover on the ceilings around my friend's house. The break could not begin.

As my itch for activity wanes as the break progresses, my list of Christmas-items-to-finish also decreases, despite my inner protests against too much Christmas break productivity. Curtis rolled in this afternoon as the snow started to fall outside, bleary eyed after a thirty hour shift, content to sit on the couch and sip cider with me for a few minutes before heading to bed for the afternoon. I should have attacked the kitchen there and then: finished the dishes, sorted the mail, tossed the leftover wrapping scraps from my (solo) wrapping party the night before. I should have addressed Christmas cards or straightened the house. Instead I opted for a mid-day nap, and as Curtis fell asleep instantly I stared out the window and watched the snow fall as I listened to his breathing.

An old children's book rhyme came into my head as I lay there, making me smile as it rolled through my mind, and I made changes to fit my own meaning. "The cleaning and scrubbing can wait till tomorrow, But Curtis won't be, as I've learned to my sorrow. So quiet down cobwebs; Dust go to sleep! I'm being with Curtis and Curtis won't keep." (adapted from Ruth Hulbert Hamilton)

The Final Stretch

2011-12-14T21:46:00.000-09:00

The sun rarely makes an appearance these days, each one becoming shorter and shorter in daylight as we creep toward winter solstice. Even as the gains of January and February feel slow, there is comfort in knowing we are making gains with each week, instead of suffering losses. As I walked across a dark parking lot today in what is typically considered afternoon I realized how accustomed I have become to this existence: the glare of florescent lighting on ice, the rhythmic breathing of car engines left on in the cold darkness, the audible gasp I uttered when I saw sunshine out of a fellow teacher's window--mine, unfortunately, faces a brick wall.

This past weekend I made a brief trip out to rural Alaska to visit a friend completing the same rotation Curtis did this past summer. While some questioned why I would ever want to travel "out there", the nostalgia of a trip that provided so much rest and relaxation this summer made it an opportunity I sought out and scheduled, rather than one I tried to get out of. The weekend trip was extended when all flights were cancelled Sunday evening, courtesy of the latest blizzard/wind storm. While my sister, and also my pickup at the airport, questioned me making it back before the flight was even delayed, I realized I wasn't in any hurry to return. I had read a whole book, made s'mores in front of a log-burning stove, watched Hallmark Christmas movies, napped, cooked, and ran. And yet I felt like I had lazed the day away in passive relaxation, uncommitted to any task.

When I finally made it out around 11am on Monday morning, I had scheduled a substitue, written lesson plans, and found out school was cancelled due to terrible road conditions. As the plane broke the clouds I was surprised to find myself on the South side of the plane, just in time to catch the sunrise. At that moment I couldn't remember the last time I saw the sun. It had been cloudy all weekend--the only days I even have the opportunity to see it.

I feel like I am on the final stretch for a lot of things right now: one day of teaching and one day of grading, two days of Curtis on this busy rotation, one week until we start gaining sunlight. And finally I feel close enough: to breathe easy, knowing it will be over and finished, confident that even as the daylight disappears, it will return eventually.

The Rain Remians

2011-12-08T21:59:00.000-09:00

The temperature has dipped to a more frigid range, and I noticed myself wishing for gloves as I ventured out in the afternoon. After a month of below zero temperatures, one week in the 40's sent me running for cover--against my "toughness" instincts. Despite the neutral temperatures, the consequences of our week-of-warm left consequences that remind me of the brief foray. Ruts indented in slush are now frozen over, leaving grooves around corners and through parking lots. Rocks spray up on the windshield as cars whip down the highway, previously laid to deal with treacherous ice, now causing their own mischief with cracks in the windshields and dents in the doors. And of course the trails won't be the same until we get a generous dump of fresh snow to cover the tracks of humans and dogs, who thought slushy ski trails wouldn't notice a pedestrian's visit.

The rain remains, you see.

Tis the season for rash behavior, it seems to me. Between the massive amounts of shopping and celebration the month brings, is a generous amount of misbehavior. Students, prematurely celebrating the freedom of Christmas break or actively dreading it, seem to double and triple their typical incidents-- leaving the office full and my soul weary. Despite the brevity of the mistakes, the consequences last beyond the hour or the day, sometimes even beyond the week.

There are times when I feel like life is a series of events--some lasting longer than I want, others lasting not long enough. To find that magical moment when the time matches the experience is truly a gift; it happens so rarely it is often nearly missed. Thus I seek to create or note those moments for myself: embracing another week of school, even as the students are restless; noting the relationships I have much time to cultivate in light of Curtis's perpetual absence; soaking up the chill in the air even as I shiver.

Winter, you are beautiful: snow, rain, darkness and all.

Too Much Excitement, or Where Did Winter Run Off To?

2011-12-04T21:53:00.000-09:00

This evening as I walked to my front door, I couldn't help but notice the balmy breeze. My running shoes, typically coated with snow that never melts from run to run, were bare and wet. It may be December 4, but someone forgot to tell the weather. While November 1 saw us hit with a snowstorm, and daily snow falls an unimaginable number of days following, the weather this week has called for weather in the mid-30's. This brought two thoughts:
1) Might as well wear a dress; after all, with all the sub-zero temperatures I haven't gone without knee high wool socks and layered sweaters for weeks.
2) Oh no.

As a skier, I have been thrilled with our weather this winter (or fall, if you go by traditional dates to determine seasons, and not types of precipitation). The snow layered for days early on, and by mid-November we had a generous base that any local would praise as impressive. Given that there have been years that the local ski trails were barely groomed in January, a quick transition from run/bike season to ski season is something to celebrate. Sure, Curtis didn't love his daily walk/bike to work when the snow plows daily covered the sidewalks with impassible accumlation, but even he loves a nicely groomed trails. In fact, he has been anxiously awaiting this weekend when his schedule would allow us to hit the trails for a nice, long outing unencumbered with a schedule.

And then the weather report came out.

"Freezing rain" it said, and then "37". Friday's school let out with all afternoon activities canceled. Curtis and I headed out of town for the weekend, and though a couple hours north turned the snow into rain, it didn't last. By Saturday night it was raining there as well, and by the time we left Sunday the trees--formerly heavy with snow--were bare and dripping. Skiing barely happened despite all our preparation, and the sixty-five degree swing from two weeks ago left us questioning which was worse: -25? or 40?

The forecast this week calls for the temperatures back in the twenties, with maybe a little snow to top off the slush and ice that now cover every trail in town. And while the last two weeks of school always hold their fair share of excitement with the holidays and an impending two week break, I'm hoping the weather gets to be a little more predictable.

I can only handle so much excitement.

A Tease

2011-11-29T14:23:00.000-09:00

Just a few days later, Thanksgiving feels like a distant memory. The extended weekend was full of visits with family, basketball games, Christmas shopping and the occasional quiet, slow-moving hour. Curtis was supposed to work through the weekend, but got off early Thanksgiving morning, which was quickly dubbed "a Thanksgiving miracle".

The break has been referred to by many of my colleagues as a tease, and I am inclined to agree. While I did manage to catch up on grading, clean the house a bit, and spend more time than usual sleeping and working out, I reached the end of the weekend ready--at last--to settle in for a break, not ready to get back to my labors.

I suppose, in the spirit of the season, this puts me in line with an attitude of advent. I seem to be always aware of the next opportunity for peace and rest, and in this life it is surely fleeting. And so we press forward, into the weeks of chaos that lead to a moment's quiet, trying to appreciate the moments of peace and joy that can be gleaned from routine struggles in everyday life.

Winter Activity: Hiding Away

2011-11-20T18:30:00.000-09:00

Essence of fall wrapped in winter…

On Friday night Curtis and I skipped town, cramming in all our chores and errands as the evening wore on, finally heading down the highway when it was nearly nine. I put together a playlist with everything from Coldplay to Sinatra, and Curtis watched the road while I fed him bites of soft serve ice cream—courtesy of Costco’s food court, our last stop for supplies before hitting the road.

The temperature dropped steadily as we made our way to the interior, starting at -4 in town and reaching a low of -19 by the time we hit my parent’s cabin. Curtis unloaded the car while I ran around the inside adjusting the thermostats, turning on the hot water heater, bringing the house to life. After a quick look around we settled into bed, falling asleep sometime after eleven—a pretty late night by our standards.

Thanks to our typical schedules we were both awake by eight, just in time to see the first signs of light across the lake. Southern exposure is highly sought after in this state, where winter light is provided by brief visits from the sun, rising and falling in a narrow arch on the South end of the sky. With more than two feet of snow on the deck we bundled up after breakfast to find the temperature hovering at -25. As our eyelashes and face-masks became covered with crystals, morning broke before our very eyes, with the brilliant sun almost causing us to forget about the frigid cold.

As we headed inside we started the car, knowing that a night and morning that cold had clearly chilled the battery to the core. It barely turned over, sputtering a few plumes of dark exhaust before roaring with force. Turns out our vehicle may need an engine block after all—that convenient means of plugging the car in for those very cold nights, an amenity not included on cars purchased in Ohio.

Later my family arrived in waves, the parents, the siblings, my sister and her beau visiting from out-of-state, and together we cooked and laughed and played games long after the sunset—which was around 4:30. The next day thin clouds hovered, just enough to take the edge off the cold, though still below zero. We gathered shovels and made sledding routes, employing an old sled to transport us back to our childhood—where hours on a hill covered with snow and sunshine were all that was needed for entertainment.

By the time we made it home there was laundry and preparation for the week ahead. We put together a pot of soup and commented on how exhausted we were—perhaps a few hours hiking up and down a hill is more work than it felt at the time? I suppose our muscles will confess all truth tomorrow, when we return to our lives as professionals with responsibilities and schedules. Until then we make our plans for a return to this winter wonderland as soon as possible, to the place where clocks and thermometers can be ignored, and nothing is on the schedule.

Stuck Inside

2011-11-18T13:11:00.000-09:00

Today, I am thinking of this...

Right now the thermometer reads -3, and that is without windchill. Given that the temperature has dropped six degrees in the last hour, I would say it's going to be a cold night. Either that, or the sunset (at 4:30pm) had a delayed effect.

Warm beaches, poolside reading and evening hot tubs are sounding really good right now, and spring break eight months ago feels like a memory from long ago.

It's getting to be that time of year: when the holidays are close but the break feels so far away.

Restless? You could say that. Spirit week at school seemed to breed a mischevious creativity amongst the students, and staying on task was more difficult than ever. Perhaps these hick-ups in the schedule are necessary in recognizing the value of "normal", but they also leave me exhausted in the evening, struggling to work on the necessary research for a paper on high-level-writing.

High level writing? How about just focus in general?

Yes, the beach is sounding very good right now, that or temperatures that don't make being outside miserable. Thick jackets and mittens are a necessity right now for a fifty foot walk to my vehicle...I can't even imagine voluntary, sustained exposure.

Winter Activity: Monday Matinee

2011-11-14T19:33:00.000-09:00

Movie-lovin', photography shootin', this sister reminds me not to take my schedule too seriously...photo taken during our sister trip to NYC a couple summers ago, which she had a large part in ~~pushing~~ inspiring us to do...

Today my sister and I ventured to round two of what has become known as our "Monday Matinee". A local small-touristy-theater decided that to boost winter business they would present a series of 80'sish films for the viewing pleasure of all who wouldn't mind seeing a young John Cusack wearing high tops and oversized trench coats. Last week we circled a few blocks too many downtown in seeking out our destination; this week we crossed the snowy streets with purpose, a careful eye toward sliding vehicles lest we miss our showing. Greeted with a selection of canned soda and gourmet popcorn, we have ventured into the miniature theater both times to find it completely empty.

Just our luck--we are the only ones that see this opportunity for the lovely outing that it is.

We laughed loudly at the subtle humor and commented on hair-dos and outfits to our hearts delight, spoiling our dinner with salt and vinegar popcorn and cherry coke. When the credits rolled, we cleaned up our empty bags and found ourselves in rush-hour downtown traffic. Never fear, we had an ipod full of a variety of music, and though the ten minute commute took us twenty-five, I hardly cared--it was hangout time at its best.

It's true: I had a backpack full of gear and skis in my car when she called me at school this afternoon asking for accompaniment to the flick. The sun was shining, the trails were calling my name, and in that moment I had to decide: sunny ski in isolation? or 80's hair on the large screen with top-notch bonding and treats?

I'd be lying if I said I wavered for a moment, but in the end, I have no doubt the right choice was made.

Quiet Accumulation

2011-11-08T17:59:00.000-09:00

Hanging wipers, lifted off the windshields in the midst of the storm to make clean off easier...

Yesterday I drove to work in a mild snowstorm. Several inches accumulated on the roads into the morning, and that was on top of the several inches that had fallen the day before. The roads were a bit more treacherous than normal, but thankfully my commute is against the grain of traffic, and when you have three lanes to yourself, it is not quite as scary to have less-than-ideal visibility.

After all, the snow cover I was craving had arrived.

On Sunday morning I woke with time to spare, thanks to daylight savings. Anxious to fit several tasks in before church, I scheduled my morning carefully: work for my online class, breakfast, further work, run, shower, tidy the house, head out. By the time 8:45 rolled around, I was ready for a break from my research and writing, but one look outside surprised me: it had snowed--a lot. Several inches had accumulated while I slept, and what previously looked like a mild case of winter was now progressing very nicely. I debated whether I was still up for the challenge, and decided that even a small run would be better than none--especially since I had already set aside the time for it.

Curtis and I live near a busy intersection, not far off of one of the major roads in town. Thus, it came as a shock to exit the neighborhood to find quiet--the fresh blanket of snow absorbing what little sound was being made by the sparse Sunday morning travellers. I headed around the corner to discover that there was no sidewalk trail to be found this quiet morning, just inches of untouched powder, waiting for someone to blaze a trail on what is typically a well-travelled route. With piano music quietly echoing in my ears, I plowed through: knees rising a bit higher than usual, ankles eventually aching from the unsteadiness of every step, breath heavy with the extra resistance every step offered. It was quiet, and challenging, and perfect.

Forty minutes later I found myself finishing my run ten minutes behind schedule. Despite the nagging notion that breaking trail would cause the "short" loop to be a bit longer, I couldn't bring myself to cut the run off. Some other task would have to wait until later, because this was an enchanting moment that only comes around once or twice a year. As the lavender sky brightened with daylight and the snow clouds melted further away, the neighborhood came to life as well--snow-blowers spitting snow off driveways and onto long ago lawns, wheels spinning as vehicles tried to negotiate inches of loose powder, vehicles sputtering down the road after an extra hour of sleep. By the time I made it home, the last stretch of sidewalk was already plowed and life was back to normal.

Later that afternoon, Curtis texted me from work to let me know that my run through the snow had officially made me his hero. Granted I felt like that was generous, but I was pretty proud of myself for actually getting out the door when I knew the run would be challenging. There are days when I look at the conditions and never bother to get out my running shoes.

Then there are days like today, when I take my mom's dog and venture out in temperatures that are heading down toward single digits, content to watch the clear sky glow as the sun sets, the pitter-patter of the dogs feet the perfect accompaniment to the sound of my rhythmic breathing.

The weather report calls for more snow this week, and if I have my way I'll be out on my skis some time this weekend. But until the next quiet, snowy adventure comes around, I'll let my still-sore muscles remind me of the time a busy thoroughfare turned into a quiet, snow wilderness, conscious of the powerful force that nature always is, even though I don't always notice.

Silent Night

2011-11-02T22:26:00.000-08:00

I went out running in a brisk wind today.
Brisk, mid teens in temperature,
not frigid like it will be come January.
After Sunday's brush with snow,
winter has continued to move in.

Halloween's costumed children had to prance around in a blowing snow storm Monday night,
with visibility that I wouldn't choose to drive in,
let alone voluntarily walk around in for an hour or two.

While the trick-or-treaters were scarce in our oh-so-boring condo complex,
they were multiplying in my friend's neighborhood,
where I ventured for the haunted evening.
I stayed at her house to hand out candy while she ventured out with her preschoolers,
perhaps more eager to fight through snow drifts than the children
in their costume covered snowsuits
let on.

And I was happy to let her go,
wrapped with a Moby wrap bundled around her two month old,
grading papers in my free moments,
watching the sugar highs and subsequent crashes as the evening wore on.

Tonight I spent my few free moments grocery shopping,
cleaning out the refrigerator,
folding dry laundry from yesterday afternoon,
fixing food to take to school for lunch,
replacing the battery in a smoke detector,
changing light bulbs in the bathroom,
in the flashing light Curtis affixes to the back of his bike.

And in these simple moments, I feel satisfied.

Once in a while my life hits a rhythm where the early morning alarm is not a burden,
where quiet reading before starting the day is a solace,
where conflicts with students are met with patience,
and the end of the day comes with a quiet sigh,
content to do it again in the morning.

I do not know if tomorrow will feel the same,
but for now my world is at peace,
a place that felt a million miles away not so many days ago.

The Breaking Point

2011-10-30T20:06:00.000-08:00

Latest autumn addition: Mulling Spices...we may or may not be on our third gallon of cider.

Today, it snowed.

I feel like I have peeked out of the blinds in my room every morning for weeks, looking for a dusting of winter. Instead I have been greeted with rain. My first whiff of air in the morning has smelled like spring instead of winter, the darkening skies not matching the other sensations.

But today, it all felt right.

Curtis was home for a quiet weekend for the first time in what felt like forever. His job, great training that it is, has felt consuming for six weeks. Throughout medical school and residency I have felt that realistic expectations have kept me balanced while his schedule is out of control. If I know I won’t see him for days, if I know he’ll be so exhausted he can’t think clearly, if I know he’ll sleep through all the hours he’s home—I’m okay.

Unfortunately, while that method seems to work for months and months of the year, inevitably I hit a point where it doesn’t matter that I know what to expect, I am still very much not okay with the situation. And at that point I worry about his health due to his ridiculous schedule; I get anxious whenever we’re together because it’s only a matter of hours before he leaves. I sleep poorly; I am impatient with my students. And all the while I wonder if I will ever go back to “normal”—if we will ever have a relationship that will be classified as such.

Then, just as suddenly, the streak ends. He’s home for a weekend, and we both sleep soundly—for hours and hours and hours.

Today, the snow felt symbolic. The odd weeks of forty-degree rain equaled out with an overdue, oh-so-seasonal snow, covering the decomposing leaves that have lain dead on the ground for almost a month. It was time.

I was ready.

Estuary Experience: Teaching Outside the Box

2011-10-13T10:10:00.000-08:00

Today:
Shovels, wheelbarrows, hoes, rakes
Broken down wood palates, old newspapers, a mature bull moose sporting an impressive rack
Tights under my jeans, a down coat, a knit hat, boots, fleece mittens

Looking at our crew, you'd never know it was mid-October--and not mid-January.

The nip in the air has been increasing all week, with Monday's morning temperature in the low thirties, and today's dipping ten degrees lower. It was easy to see our breath as we gathered rotted wood and rusted barbed wire in an attempt to clean up city-owned property: an old homestead turned estuary.

Some of the teachers I work with discovered this service-learning opportunity a couple years ago and have taken students to this site to help with every phase of the project, from dismantling the original homestead and make-shift shacks to gathering up debris and trash from the surrounding area. The students were shuttled through different activities, from identifying local critters to observing and discussing the diverse bird population in the estuary, but many enjoyed the manual labor most. After all, how often do most teenagers get to dismantle rotting, wooden structures with brute force? How often do they get to destroy anything without getting in trouble?

Though the chill was enough to numb my fingers and toes by noon, by the end of the afternoon I could feel my face glowing from the sunshine. There is something satisfying about working alongside the students in something other than constructing stories. There is gratification in seeing a clean field where there was previously a generous spread of debris.

When we returned to school, we spread one of many treasures we found in the debris out on my classroom tables: newspapers from 1981. They marveled at the advertisements and the haircuts, and commented about the style of the televisions. They were in awe of the housing prices, which is perhaps what has changed most in the last thirty years, and noted the businesses with which they were still familiar. It is crazy to think that thirty years ago someone lived in a house on that abandoned field, on a bluff overlooking the ocean when now there is nothing now but ruins. Up in Alaska we have so few "old" structures, so little preserved, tangible history that experiencing old buried cow bones and newspapers mysteriously wrapped in plastic feels sort of like an archaeological dig.

Tomorrow we return to the norm: books, papers, pencils, bells. I hope in the return is a new sense of energy that can only come from running through fields of tall grass, working together in projects where I am no more skilled than they are. Yes, in the classroom I call the shots, but they have as much to contribute as I do. And hopefully today reminded them of that fact.

Content with Company

2011-10-11T10:48:00.000-08:00

Last week was spent in catch up mode, the product of many weeks of days packed to the brim. I shopped for groceries and cooked meals from scratch. I made appointments for health check ups, oil changes, and tire changes. I hung a curtain rod I purchased two months ago. I slept. I returned items to stores from purchases made this summer--barely making it under the ninety day limit. I graded stacks of papers, desperate to finish them for this week--the last of the quarter.

By the time the weekend rolled around I felt rejuvenated, and the sunny clear skies seemed bright as well.

In sharp contrast to my recovery week was Curtis's, where he was slammed from Wednesday on. On Friday he awoke from a few hours of sleep after unexpectedly spending a second night at the hospital in a row. He came out to the kitchen to find a myriad of food items: kale and mango salad, macaroni with creamy squash sauce, pumpkin gingerbread. After the cooking hiatus that has come from my coaching, he probably thought he was still sleeping. We feasted and played card games: me, happy to have him home and awake; him, making corny jokes, and laughing at them in his sleep-deprived state. He was asleep by 9pm on this Friday night, and I lay in bed awake--rested from my generous amounts of sleep, content with my productivity, happy to have a partner, if only for a few hours.

There are many sides of contentedness, I am discovering as my life shifts from a packed schedule to a more leisurely pace. Friday's healthy, homemade feast with Curtis left me just as content as Thursday's date in the hospital cafeteria, and Wednesday's dinner at home with a friend I hadn't seen in weeks. The commonality is not the busyness that I sometimes mistake as fulfilling, but rather the people I am busy with--at work, at home, with friends, with family.

Yesterday, Curtis was unexpectedly home by four in the afternoon, and we headed out into the sunny, cool afternoon to bike for a while. By the time we were finished my legs were weary and my toes were frozen, but the unexpected time together was a gift. Cracking through frozen puddles, slipping around corners on the generous blanket of leaves, weaving around other wanderers out with dogs and children and spouses was all I wanted to do yesterday afternoon. Having Curtis to do it with? Even better.

That Which is Measurable

2011-10-03T19:56:00.000-08:00

I woke tired this morning, and hung on to the fatigue as the day progressed. Nothing could seem to lift me from this funk: not sunshine through the windows, not a canceled meeting at lunch, not candy from the bowl in the counseling office. "I need energy and optimism," I confessed to a colleague of mine as I picked through the wrapped treats. She, who is much older and wiser than myself, agreed that today seemed to be made of such sentiments.

Unfortunately, one fun size Almond Joy and one mini-vanilla-Tootsie-Roll were not the solution.

Returning my desk to get to work during my prep period I was greeted with an online report card, feedback on my first week's work for an online class. This class was the thief of many hours of what could have been free time on Sunday, which I spent reflecting on writing curriculum and personal writing habits rather than idling away time hanging out with Curtis, watching Hulu, or baking cookies. While the three essays and numerous feedback comments led to a reflective afternoon and evening, they left me drained of all creative energy come morning, and bitter that the time had been spent while Curtis was home.

And then I opened the email. Do you remember that moment when you no longer received tangible, measurable feedback? Perhaps it was after high school, maybe college or even graduate school. As much as I did not miss the finals, the schedule, or the endless mountains of reading upon graduation, I did miss the consistent tangible measures of how I was doing. Letters, every few months, would be posted to match my progress, and I could assure myself that my work was worthwhile, no matter how insecure I felt in my developing skills.

Then, I became a teacher. Sure, I have observations with administrators and the occasional pat-on-the-back email from an appreciative parent. But I also have rants from other parents frustrated about a teaching unit or method, some students failing for any number of reasons, and a general attitude of apathy from other students that I can't figure out how to combat. At the end of the day I can give myself a grade for how I feel I performed, but it doesn't seem to hold as much weight as the one that was issued on perforated card stock the week after each semester ended--nor is it as unbiased.

It turns out that a good old fashioned report card was what I needed today, a little positive feedback that tells me "Great job! You excel at writing essays about yourself, reading pages of a textbook, and incorporating that information into your classroom model. You can be critical as well as inquisitive about writing instruction, and you have great voice."And then I felt okay about afternoon classes that were boring and distracted, about impatience with the girl that tried to blame me for her missing assignment, about the fact that I'm never going to finish my units in time for the end of the quarter. For a moment, measurable feedback from an outside source trumped the self-critical-and-sometimes-reflective attitude that forces me to proclaim each day as a success or failure.

Today I declare success: We moved forward even though I was tired; I forced students to pay attention even though they wanted to sleep. Tomorrow is another day, hopefully filled with energy and optimism, hopefully declared success as well--even though I'll have to wait until next week for more tangible feedback.

Week Seven, or Elusive Rhythm

2011-09-30T07:20:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I get to the end of the school day only to discover that I never changed the date on the board. The worst is when I realized that the date inked onto the surface is not only not today, but it is not yesterday either. That is when I know I've been drowning in chaos, pure and simple, with students hovering around me all day, asking questions--good and bad, not paying attention, or only paying enough attention to note my personal mistakes.

"Congratulations, overly attentive student, you have reminded all of us that I, indeed, am human. No, it is not September 26 any longer. Yes, I know that was Monday. Yes, I know that it is now Thursday. No, I don't need you to change it for me."

And then I try to move on, acting as if the calendar error does not drive me crazy, calculating subconsciously how many weekends I have between now and the end of the quarter, calculating simultaneously how many of those weekends Curtis is working, leaving me free to bury myself in amateur writing samples with varying investments of time and effort.

Week seven has proved to be the magical number the year, the week that grants me a rhythm to ride out the curriculum. I'm not sure if it takes me that long to get to know my students, or it the foundational teaching of those first several weeks feels fragmented, but whatever the reason is, week seven feels a bit more predictable, a bit more relaxed. And I guess that's why, after a Monday and Tuesday that felt very put-together, Wednesday and Thursday feel so undeniably off. Was it the almost-fight that set some students on edge? Is it the impending boredom that comes as I become less and less original? Perhaps the pressure of the quickening end of the grading period?

Whatever the reason, I would like to eradicate it as soon as possible. I would like my dates to be in order, my grading completed, and my students at peace.

And as soon as I discover the formula to take care of these things, the peaceful rhythm that started week seven can return and make itself at home. There is, after all, only so much chaos I can take in a week--I am still human, which they so often remind me.

Disappearing

2011-09-28T07:11:00.000-08:00

The sunlight seems to be disappearing these days faster than I can capture and appreciate it. I stare longingly at the rays through my classroom windows, begrudgingly tilting blinds to keep the glares out of my students eyes, and race from the building out onto trails after the bell has released me—or was it my students?—for the day.

There are times for staying and working for hours after the students have long since boarded the buses—September sun seems to veto the mere thought of it.

We broke past fifty degrees again this afternoon, seemingly miraculous when some late September days have found us staring at fresh flakes, and even as I heated in my long-sleeved shirt I welcomed the natural warmth. Sure, I can find heat under a blanket or near a fire, but it doesn’t match the feel of sun on bare legs and pale faces; I doubt it ever will.

While nature heads toward hibernation, I sense the same with Curtis. A friendly schedule this summer has seemingly come to an end, with the current schedule taped to the fridge with silent earnestness: “schedule social outings of your own, or become a hermit” it seems to cry.

Oddly enough, it is the hermitage of this summer I was craving this morning as I drove to school: a week in a small Alaskan village. The trip I was warned about turned out to be the vacation we never expected, complete with long walks on the tundra, lazy afternoons to bake bread, and endless rounds of the only game we found in the place—backgammon. I miss the simplicity even as I remember struggling to embrace it.

In moments such as this I feel akin to my students, people struggling against boundaries even as they need them. I fill my schedule, often to the brim, unable to either say “no” or willingly embrace solitude. Yet I find myself craving it, in the quiet of morning mountain sunrises, in the chaos of a hallway packed with teenagers, in the evening moments I gather my belongings for one more day of work before shuffling under the covers. That is when I remember that a reluctant two weeks of rubber boots and a raincoat in a isolated village became the monumental event of the summer, the moment I want to go back and reclaim.

Perhaps tomorrow I’ll ask my students if I can kick myself into the hall to work for a while, away from the chaos of the classroom, and I will leave them in charge. Perhaps they’ll walk away with the same revelation—you don’t always have what you want, but perhaps it is what you need.

The Tipping Point

2011-09-19T19:37:00.000-08:00

My life has seemed to teeter on the brink of options as of late, in many areas of my life. At home, we are currently in negotiations about when the heater gets turned on. Our original goal was October, but with the latest dip in temperatures, where they barely break fifty, I’m not sure I’m going to make it.

Current spread: When the indoor temperature fails to break 60, the heater is coming on—whether or not the calendar page has turned.

Curtis, while holding strong on the goal of October for the furnace, has been on the conservative side in a sensitive issue in our relationship, my foot. Having both struggled with our fair share of injuries in high school, college and beyond, we know the reality of most distance running injuries: if you don’t give it a break, it will get worse—not better. This is an exercise of patience and self-discipline when I am coaching daily—regardless of what my foot feels like—and would like to get a workout in in the process. Whether at school or home my icing ritual has begun to feel normal, and walking (rather than running) around meets is beginning to feel a bit less foreign.

Current spread: Ten days off with one workout in the middle leaves me feeling quite a bit better than I was last week. With twelve days left in the season, it’s anyone’s guess if I’ll be able to withstand any sustained running (without carrying an ice pack around with me for the rest of the evening) before the season is over.

While running free from injury has been a goal since long before we moved back to Alaska, there were other goals that have since changed. When we lived in Ohio, we were accruing debt twice as fast as I pulled in a paycheck. While breaking even wasn’t an option, living off our means was always our goal—and it wasn’t an easy one.

Now that Curtis isn’t in school, our grocery shopping doesn’t have to be quite as creative, but I have to admit I often miss it. Perhaps my favorite low-priced-great-buy grocery plan was the one I executed every November 1. The day after Halloween our local grocery store would mark all pumpkins down to 99 cents—for the whole thing. I would go after school, pick one large one out, and bring it home to hollow out, steam, and puree. Measured bags of pumpkins would be preserved in the freezer and pulled out for the rest of the year, reminding me of my savvy shopping, and giving us a little taste of autumn year round.

Autumn comes early in this place, leaves turning before we hit September, snow already making an appearance on the mountains. The constant nip in the air plagues me as I stand idly at practice, as I bury my foot in ice water, as I bundle up in our chilly condo, as I crave pumpkin from my freezer in Ohio—and my current ice box is bare.

Current spread: Current grocery shopping takes place at frantic intervals when we have nothing left to eat—often late at night and without the deals easily found in the Midwest. We still choose to go without plenty of items, but the flexibility of our budget lends itself to a different challenge--perhaps even more difficult than the first: spending and saving wisely and carefully, because we have the funds to do so.

Life seems so steady at times and so uncertain at others. Often changes take place with no warning, and no choice. Perhaps that is why this current interval is so intriguing: I am watching the shifts as they play out, often by daily choices and consequences. And that is a luxury I am willing to embrace.

They're Back

2011-09-14T20:37:00.000-08:00

The moths, that is. We found them perched on our doorstep when we moved in late September last year, and it turns out that they'd been there for a while. Along with the September moths, the smell in the air has shifted from fresh, clean summer to deteriorating, decomposing fall. This smell drives me back in time, to cross country races and long walks flanked by bright leaves that shower you when the wind blows.

Yes, that is the season we are in.

In the Midwest this season starts late and lasts long, here I feel lucky to squeeze two weeks out of the colored branches. But whether we end up with an Indian summer like last year or bare branches flecked with snow before October, I am satisfied to proclaim--I have experienced it. Fall has come: smell, colors, moths and all. Daylight is rapidly disappearing, which I measure most closely by the state of the sunrise during my commute. Is the sky dark? Dusky? Are the mountains glowing with a silhouette? The day I dread is the first one where sunrise is so far gone, I cannot distinguish the mountains from the sky. That is when winter truly begins for me.

Perhaps I should dig out my wax and skis so that an early snow is met with celebration rather than disdain? Maybe next week...

Give and Take

2011-09-12T21:16:00.001-08:00

The past week has flown by, complete with many moments that I wished to sit down and record on paper but very few moments to actually do so. The exhaustion of Labor Day weekend seemed to carry beyond the generous amounts of sleep scheduled throughout the week, leaving me awake and annoyed in the early morning hours when I felt I was clearly tired enough to keep sleeping, but couldn't manage to do so.

That theme seemed to carry throughout the week, with aspirations of outdoor activity being cut short by a gnawing foot injury from an unfortunate rock that I landed on incorrectly, and with aspirations of leisurely reading being replaced with the consumption of student writing--some more entertaining than others.

The swift, drastic change from the freedom and relaxation of summer to the densely packed schedule of fall seemed to be weighing on me greatly this week, with my emotions torn between appreciation and gratitude for all the productive ways I get to work, and exhaustion from a schedule that is packed to the brim, with overflowing tasks getting neglected in the midst. Multitasking only goes so far, which was magnified as I tried to grade student papers while submerging my aching foot in a bowl of ice water.

Today the load seems to be a bit lighter: grading almost finished for mid-quarter report cards, stories from this round of writing complete with rubrics to be returned to students, and time this evening to catch up on tasks I thought I would easily finish this weekend. If it's not grading, it's laundry. If it's not a missed deadline, it's an empty refrigerator. If it's not a bruised foot, it's a strained quad. I suppose the gift of a full schedule is the curse of give and take, and as much as I loved the freedom of the summer, a hearty laugh from a well-written student story is pretty satisfying as well.

Rituals

2011-09-05T16:49:00.000-08:00

There is, perhaps, no greater time to practice rituals than when two people commit their lives together. Over time these practices accumulate and pass hands, sometimes with those practicing them not even aware of where they came from.

This past weekend I immersed myself in all things wedding, complete with shower, rehearsal, actual event, and all sorts of meals in between. It was a small family affair, with fewer than fifty people in attendance at the wedding—most of whom attended every event of the weekend. By the end of the four day event I knew the bride’s family and friends well enough to converse with them freely, associate appropriate spouses, children and cousins with the appropriate relatives and names, and find my way to their respective houses sprinkled around the small town.

Between the guessing games at the shower that required the donning and removal of plastic flower leis, to the rose petals that lined the aisle and were sprinkled by small girls wearing garlands on their heads, to the color coordinated tuxedos, small boxes of candies and labeled playing cards left on the tables for guests to take away with them as favors—these are images seen as conventional to the modern wedding guest, yet are odd random practices if you actually stop and think about it.

My new sister-in-law has been to more than her fair share of weddings, and has patiently waited for her turn to plan a monumental day. She was far from ridiculous about the details of the wedding, and when items couldn’t be carried out as planned it did not really both her. Yet, the reality remained that this wedding day was one that she had been looking forward to for a long time—not just for the event, but for the future it symbolized.

As we sat in church the morning of the wedding and stood in line for communion, I was struck by the presence of rituals in so much of life. We practice them in church, in the classroom, even in the day-to-day existence in our families. Rituals offer a structure for a symbolic event that while represented by a single evening on a single day, reverberates beyond that moment and comes into existence over time. A wedding may take place on a Sunday evening under blue skies, but a marriage—as most married couples will attest—is built over time from the fruit of shared experiences, good and bad. Just as the bread and wine do not create a spiritual reality, it creates an event to reflect on, a tangible reality to represent a truly immeasurable occurrence.

We are on the road again today, driving back from the small town wedding to the large city airport, where we will fly back to our everyday existence. And even though the exhaustion from four days of late nights and busy days will carry through the week, the trip was very much a success: a few nights away from it all, temperatures in the 80’s and 90’s, time with Curtis’s family and the addition of new friends all came together with the reminder that hopefully comes to all married people when there is a wedding: remember where you came from, remember how you felt, cling tight to the words that you spoke, for today is merely a symbol—now you go out and bring it to life.

84 East

2011-09-02T04:13:00.001-08:00

We left the great state of Alaska at 12:55am Thursday morning, and arrived in the Northwest three hours later. Going on less than three hours of sleep with swollen feet left me listless and nauseous—and feeling the need to keep my mouth shut at all costs. Thirty minutes later, a cup of coffee in hand, I understood Curtis’s life a bit better.

“Now I see why you drink so much coffee. This really is a drug,” I commented to him as we claimed our bags, one of which apparently missed the flight. Earlier in our walk through Portland’s airport I commented to him that three hours of sleep did not make me feel like a very healthy person.

“It’s an acquired taste,” Curtis replied.

Let’s just hope I never have to work on my palate.

We hit the road by 6am, and drove out of town in a morning darkness I haven’t witnessed since last April. The landscape of pine-laden, lush hills slowly turned into dry, desert looking rock formations, and the sun rising to reveal a blue sky was a welcome change after the downpours of rain we have had the past few days.

After an hour and a half of driving we stopped at a restaurant recommended to us by the rental car agent: Cousins. And, in case you were wondering, that is what everyone called us. Back on the highway again it was clear that the lack of sleep was beginning to wear on us, our conversation slowing a bit, our eyes becoming heavy against the bright sun.

As a child my family often drove up and down the West Coast once or twice a year to visit relatives and friends, packing up the car for ten, twelve, fourteen hour days accompanied by Adventures in Odyssey, new coloring books, and regular rest area stops. By the time I was twelve I could predict the likely stops along I-5, and name the towns along the way.

Today’s drive reminded me of these trips, though this time I am with Curtis’s family instead of my own. The miles of rural landscape, the occasional stretch of the legs and moderately tended public restrooms, the hours of quiet to sit and think and dream, it all felt very familiar. And I found myself wondering if the person I was at twelve knew that those trips would be the source of such nostalgia so many years down the road.

The older I get the more I grasp what will stick with me long term and what will pass and never be thought of again. The more I write the more I am glad I will have a recording of how I felt on occasions such as this, sleep deprived and slightly carsick from sitting in the back of the minivan: satisfied, full, and in awe of the way that life brings us back to places I was long ago, unsure of if I would every return.

Rich

2011-08-31T22:59:00.002-08:00

Today I felt rich:
A morning with Curtis not in a rush to head to the hospital
A lunch with good conversation, a welcome break from a hectic day
A workout in the rain, that still felt refreshing even as I nursed an injury from the sidelines
And dinner with Curtis's family, all together from islands and other states, ready for a weekend altogether--the first since last Christmas

This weekend we add another place to the family table when Curtis's brother gets married, and I plan on feasting my senses on everything around me. I hope for rest, but realize I will most likely return to work exhausted--but thoroughly satisfied.

There are days when get lost in the monotony of every day life, and there are days like today--when the richness of all I am blessed with seems to overflow.

Hunting for Predictability

2011-08-30T22:45:00.000-08:00

My mother raised me with a love for fresh air: outside, inside, everywhere. It didn’t matter where we lived or what the temperature was, the windows would be open often, satisfying her need for “new air”, her need to dispel a stuffiness that often only she could sense.

Today when I got home from school I was cold. The condo, which has held a comfortable temperature for the past few months without the aid of our heater, is starting to dip into uncomfortable ranges. The weather is starting to change, reflected in the leaves as much as the thermometer. And even as I crave the elusive clear, sunny day, the chill that comes with the absence of clouds is unmistakable. Soon the snow will arrive, first in a thin blanket and then in rich layers that settle onto roads and forest paths groomed for skiing, plowed for driving, and protecting the foliage until it appears again next year.

The school year is now in full swing, the honeymoon phase over, the true colors beginning to shine. As I become more comfortable and familiar with my students and classes, they become more honest as well—sometimes with frank or awkward conversations, sometimes with disrespectful or inappropriate comments. Every year that I teach I realize that every group of students is unique. Some forget pencils but always remember their homework. Some never read instructions but are honest in every discussion. Some follow directions perfectly but have trouble thinking outside the box.

This year is barely in swing, but I’m already beginning to sense the strengths and weaknesses of my classes. One class might appear to understand everything—until I examine their work more closely. Another class may ask endless questions but show their depth of thought in surprising ways.

The first few weeks feel a bit like a scavenger hunt, looking for clues about how the instruction is going to play out, trying to get a feel for the year. The reality is that there is little that can be predicted in a school year, just like I cannot predict the first snow. It will come, and winter will last several months and then the snow will melt. The trees will bloom, the weather will warm and in nine months I will say goodbye to a class that I finally know well, to trade them in for another classroom of strangers.

Eventually I will strike a balance as I get to know the intricacies of my classes, and once I hit the rhythm of the year I may get lost in the lull of routine. Until then I continue with my hunt for clues, knowing that this year’s students—just like every year before—are one of a kind.

Enjoying the Ride

2011-08-26T06:44:00.000-08:00

It is possible that I go overboard when I use metaphors in the classroom. Perhaps it is the curse of being an English teacher, perhaps that is just how I see life--through connections and reflectionships between experiences and practices in seemingly unrelated areas of life. Whatever the reason, I clearly have a problem with it. I can only hope that my students make sense of my mixed metaphors as they dominate my explanations of writing form and manner, trying to help them understand what being a writer is really like.

A few years ago while trying to explain the expository essay to a group of seniors I started to explain it in terms of prom: the importance of presentation, the value of the dress as a crucial centerpiece while the accessories--crucial in accent and completion--could not function on their own. We discussed first and last impressions, the disrupted facade when the outfit was ruined with a trip or a spill, and the importance that this impression last beyond the experience, much like good writing should continue to hang in our subconscious beyond mere consumption.

Now that I teach younger teenagers, the prom illustration had to be updated a bit. I have used sandwiches to illustrate the layering of information and analysis, but this time I was looking especially for a means to illustrate the reality of editing--that it isn't a quick process, that your first draft shouldn't be your final, that reading your personal narrative once over doesn't constitute a finished draft. So this time we spoke about cleaning. We discussed the basic vacuum and windex once-over you could give your house, the second layer cleaning in dusting the tops of bookshelves and picture frames, the deep cleaning you might do in wiping baseboards and wiping down walls and corners. Based on the looks on their faces it was pretty obvious who had taken part in such cleaning expeditions at home and who had absolutely no idea what I was talking about. Cleaning the walls? Who does that?

Despite the breakdown in my attempt at expressing how deep editing can go, and how long it can take if your really analyze each sentence and word, it seemed to at least begin to get the idea across. One ninety minute block period isn't an unrealistic time to clean up an essay; in fact, some writers would quickly argue it is only the beginning.

One of my favorite things about teaching adolescents in their view of the world; it is so straight forward. "This is how you write; this is how you fix, and then you are finished," their eyes tell me. As an adult I can look back and know I had the same view in my writing as a teen, and that I have since found writing to be a bit more layered and complex--just like life.

Every time I have students submit writing I experience a combination of excitement and dread. I love the glimpse they give me into their lives, and I get so weary of the time-intense process that evaluating and grading actually is. At best they will reflect their understanding of the writing process I tried to teach; at worst they show me the communication breakdown that ended with assignment a far cry from what I was hoping. And in that way I guess it makes my existence a lot like theirs, riding a roller coaster of emotional highs and lows while trying to assign objective grades to topics that are clearly a bit more complicated.

(Pardon the metaphor...)

Regardless, this weekend will find me with a stack of stories on my lap as we venture out of town for the weekend. The weather isn't expected to be stellar, but the scenery rarely fails to impress--with or without the sunshine. And that, my friends, makes any stack of grading a bit more enjoyable.

Settling Back In

2011-08-24T21:33:00.000-08:00

The window in our apartment in rural Alaska, which I stared out of in the afternoons, anxiously awaiting Curtis's return home.

Curtis couldn't sleep last night, and I awoke in the middle of the night to an empty bed. In the midst of the middle-of-the-night haze, I could not remember if he was supposed to be home or not. Was he at the hospital? The middle of nowhere Alaska? Doing something else I should remember? He has never been as consistent of a sleeper as I have, prone to getting up in the middle of the night to read for a while, cuddled up on the couch. I guess I never knew that people did this before I was married. I assumed that all adults, once tucked into bed for the evening, stayed there as they had been trained to as children-- until the acceptable time to get up had arrived.

I am finding that this summer's separation has sent me into a nostalgic, reflective state about our marriage, which marked four years while we were hundreds of miles apart. Perhaps the old adage is true: absence makes the heart grow fonder. I would also add that it reminds you of all the things you used to have control of while you were single, and all the ways you have grown to accommodate another once you share the same home.

One of my professors in college lost her husband to an unexpected health tragedy before I met her, leaving her as a single mom with two small children. One of her friends painted a watercolor series to represent this experience in her life, characterizing two trees that grew together, only to have one fade away. I was always haunted by this artwork as a student visiting her house, and I continue to remember this visual--especially as I have a spouse of my own that I have become intertwined with. The absence of what has become a fixture truly changes the way one operates in life, no matter how much I try to convince myself that my independence leaves me largely unaffected.

One of my coworkers was reunited with her husband after seeing him only once this last year. His military absence, the third they have endured in over twenty years of marriage, strains their relationship to say the least. Yet this coworker is quick to remark about how much better things are now than they were in the past--Skype alone has revolutionized what it means to be across the world or across the state.

Sometimes my students remark on the beauty that will be their lives someday, when homework is a thing of the past, as will be parental boundaries, mandatory dress codes and other restraints by which they feel stifled. When they remark about this future perfection I try to remind them with stories of my own that life is never perfect: there is always someone telling you what to do, how to dress, and restraining your "ideal" with reality. This world we live in is beautiful and fulfilling, but it is also broken.

I guess that is the beauty of a separation that has finally come to an end; it leaves me so thankful for the struggles that come in sharing living space, because they are also accompanied with joy. This morning I asked my coworker how married life was treating her these days. She commented quickly that she's never been so happy to be frustrated with her spouse. "It's glorious," she stated.

And even though our two month separation isn't anything close to a year, I would surely agree.

Equations

2011-08-22T20:53:00.000-08:00

My birthday celebration at our condo last week. We discovered moments before this that candles had apparently not made the "move" list. It was the first birthday celebrated at our house, after all.

If I were to create an equation for the presence of writing in my life, it might look something like this:

Job + Coaching + Curtis = Little time for writing.

My life has gradually been filled to bursting these past three weeks, first with the start of a new season, then with the addition of the school year, and finally with Curtis’s return home. It hasn’t been a seamless transition—there always seem to be aches with growing to absorb a change, even when it’s one I have weathered countless times before—but generally these are all changes I welcome with open arms. I love my work with students, both in the classroom and in athletics, and I love having Curtis back at home—even if that means that my systems and organization are disrupted, the laundry piles up twice as fast, and the food seems to be perpetually eaten.

Consequently, I haven’t had much time to sit and think. Sometimes I lie awake in the night, listening to quiet, trying to process the day: What was that student’s name? What could that athlete have done differently? Why did it bother me so much to see Curtis’s travel toiletries out for a week following his return?

Writing has become a necessary processing of life for me, if not in this venue, in an unpublished document stored safely away on my computer hard drive. I think more clearly and value the details of life more fully when I sit and enumerate my experiences on paper, often planning hours in advance for a window of writing that might possibly present itself—only to find it slip away at the mercy of a bathroom needing to be cleaned or dinner that has yet to be made.

I suppose it is nothing surprising to see optional life activities sacrificed at the alter of necessity, and yet this optional life activity of writing has become necessity—even with all the other loves I compress into my limited twenty-four hours.

Yes, the school year has started. I hope in its midst that I can hold onto slivers of contemplative rest, left over from a quiet summer. After all, I often feel that the opposite of the above equation leaves me in an even more dissatisfying lurch:

No job + No activities + No company = Nothing to write about anyway.

Here Comes the Sun

2011-08-12T07:35:00.000-08:00

The sun came out yesterday in glorious summer form, taunting me as I stared out the window from my classroom and warming my shoulders as I ran with the students at practice, but it only added to a glow I already had.

You see, Curtis is coming home today—finally.

It has been a long summer for our relationship, feeling kind of like college when we would part ways for the summer. We did get together every once in a while—a week at the end of June, almost two weeks at the end of July—but when you total the time, he has been gone for eight weeks this summer, and I’ve been out of town with him for fewer than two weeks.

The summer has still had plenty of bright spots: trips out of town, projects completed, time with family and friends in generous amounts. Yet in the midst of all the enjoyment was also the realization (in case I needed a reminder) of how much Curtis adds to so many of my life experiences.

I guess that it’s good that I married the guy, because I love having him around.

Lessons in Persistence

2011-08-07T22:26:00.000-08:00

I have a pair of shorts I still wear regularly that my mom bought for me back in high school. The edges are slightly frayed, the seam on the left side torn slightly, the string initially thread around the waist long since pulled out in the wash. But despite the stains, the missing stitches, and elastic that is growing weak, the shorts work just fine for a long run in the wood where no one cares what I look like as long as a little mud is a welcome addition.

On Friday the sun came out for the first practice all week. Wednesday’s slop fest was followed by an even worse run on Thursday where the valley between two mountains was a wind tunnel and the rain pelted our faces with such a stinging force that I couldn’t look ahead without squinting and shielding my eyes for a quick glance. My coat rustled in the wind like a parachute, and the wind howled so loud I could hardly speak to people right beside me.

On Friday we talked about mental toughness. Sure, the conditions were miserable Thursday and some of the athletes were ill prepared—but could they have pushed further? So much of athletics is mental toughness: what do you believe you are capable of? When the wind and rain are in your face, can you run a couple more steps? A half-mile? Four?

If there is one thing I have gained from twelve years of running, it is an increased appreciation for the difference between mind and body. Eight years of organized competition and two marathons later I know that it is very easy to cave when the workout is hard, the conditions are bad, or I just don’t feel good. And sometimes—knowing that I could continue—I stop.

One morning a couple summers ago Curtis and I woke four hours before church to fit in a twenty-mile run. It was a rainy day at the end of a month long visit that we spent sleeping on a futon at my mom’s house, and I just couldn’t do it. I was leaving to fly back to the Midwest without Curtis, who had to finish a rotation. My body was tired from the endless miles that I was logging at the peak of marathon training, and the endless rain that August grated on my optimism. I wanted sunshine. I wanted more sleep. I wanted more time with my husband. I had mentally lost the battle for that run hours before my alarm went off as I lay awake in bed dreading it.

After church we had a four-hour block before dinner, before my flight, and we set out to complete the deferred run. It was still gray and raining, but the earlier defeat had not sat well with me, and I knew if I got on the plane without completing it I would spend fourteen hours disappointed. So Curtis hopped on the bike and we ran…and ran…and ran. All the way out to my old house, past the school I would get a job at two years later, up the epic hill that challenged me endlessly on summer training runs in high school and college, and around the routes that I traced during high school practices over and over again.

I walked away from that run soaked, chaffing, and with an aching Achilles tendon that would give me trouble for the next three weeks. But I got onto that plane with soreness that kept me awake and satisfied on three flights, and through the full day of in service training that followed. I had won the mental fight that day, and would find that training perhaps even more valuable when the marathon race the following September turned into a battle to finish rather than to hit a particular time.

Coaching a high school team that runs on the same trails and races at the same venues that I did is a perfect avenue for wandering down memory lane on a regular basis. And in revisiting specific runs and races I find myself measuring how far I have been stretched and how much I have experienced since high school.

A lot of my athletes would benefit greatly from an extra measure of mental toughness, that will to push through discomfort and adversity when they meet it in practice or races. The reality is that most of them haven’t had the opportunity to gather it yet. They haven’t yet really struggled for something, fought for something, worked against opposition for a goal that couldn’t possibly be lost. And that, perhaps, is my favorite part of coaching. While I can’t force anyone to fight for a race or a workout that they could just as easily coast through, I can certainly offer them the opportunity.

Sometimes one opportunity is all it takes: the chance to learn that pushing a moment longer, hanging on a second more is the difference between success and just another day. At times the only thing on the line is a race, or a long run in training for a bigger event. Other times it’s one more day at work, one more conversation about a difficult topic, or one more hour of being optimistic about a difficult situation. Whatever is at stake, I feel like challenging workouts and long runs on the trails have trained me to withstand the circumstances in life that wear me down to a breaking point. There may be nothing special about a pair of old running shorts and trails that weave through neighborhoods around town, but this is the uniform I wore in learning important life lessons, and those routes hold the same nostalgia as a valuable text.

I wish I could share these truths with high school students in a language they would understand. I would love for them to understand that fighting for a workout is good practice for fighting for substance in life . But I know that if someone had told me all this when I was fourteen, I would have raised an eyebrow and tucked it in the back of my mind with wisdom that I knew to have value but didn’t quite understand.

Years down the road, when I had learned the truth for myself, I would have finally understood what I had to recognize for myself—and I hope that they can do the same.

Chasing the Chill

2011-08-03T23:07:00.000-08:00

Tundra cotton on a rainy day last week...

I learned a long time ago that newspaper stuffed into soaking wet running shoes helps them to dry out faster. I am hoping that 22 hours will be long enough.

Today was day three of cross country season, and even though it has rained every day, today was the pinnacle of sloppiness. It didn’t take more than 100 meters to determine that the fields we were running for our workout were logged with water from days of rain. First it soaked our shoes and socks, then as the workout proceeded it was kicked up in our faces and up our backs—soaking every piece of clothing we were wearing and freckling our faces with mud.

I finished practice with waterlogged shoes, sore legs, and a bruise on my calf the shape and size of a small carrot. I don’t remember where I got it (nothing has changed since I was a child, apparently), but it is very sensitive to both touch and movement.

Also needed in 22 (well, now 18 hours)? A fully-functional left calf muscle, to help me climb a mountain during tomorrow’s practice.

There’s no question that the soreness I gather from the first week of practice lingers longer than it did when I was in high school, but the satisfaction of completing punishing runs and workouts is just as fulfilling as it was at fifteen. Challenging and testing my body physically is one thing that I will always have an odd attraction to, even if it leaves me staggering around slightly hunched over and not always stable in step in the evening and days that follow.

It has been a quick adjustment back into society these past three days, with details that have been conveniently out of sight needing to be attended to: a large stack of mail, an empty refrigerator, plans for a quickly approaching school year. Yet the rhythm of daily workouts, which will quickly be joined by daily teaching, is welcome after two weeks in the middle of nowhere with hours to walk the tundra, to bake bread, and to read leisurely to the sound of rain on the windows.

Vacations, as wonderful as they are, are only enjoyable because of the substance of life there is to return to. This trip, this summer, has left me rested and ready to rejoin the workforce, the schedule, hours that exhaust and fulfill simultaneously.

When my job finds me trying to keep up with teenagers, headed home wet and cold for the third day in a row, and cringing when I try and climb the stairs to my condo, I find myself satisfied and thankful. There are many things I am thankful for tonight: a job that I enjoy, a body that withstands punishing workouts, and a hot cup of tea to chase the chill—at least until tomorrow.

Fog, Spaghetti, and Definitions of Happiness

2011-07-29T09:59:00.000-08:00

I found this quote this morning and immediately did a self-evaluation: “Ashley, what are you not appreciating that you could be?”

I’ll tell you what I wasn’t loving: the cloudy/misty/rainy concoction that was brewing outside, rotating approximately ever 47 minutes but never letting on any hint of sunshine.

Yesterday, you see, had set the bar high. Yesterday the sun came out with such fervor that I put on shorts and a tank top and sat outside our apartment to work on online course work. The glare was strong, but I persevered, determined to be out in the sun as much as I wanted. After an hour I was so hot (and so un-sunscreened) that I ventured back inside. This also may have been due to the fact that while reading notes from a very dark screen works okay, taking a test when you’re not exactly sure what the question says is not as good of an idea.

And what happened? The sun stayed out—all afternoon and evening. Curtis and I ventured out for a walk later that evening and the heat remained. The horizon was beautiful, the tundra was green, and the streets were plentiful with smiling faces fit to enjoy the miraculous weather that should not be taken for granted.

It was too good to last, of course. Today I woke to the sound of construction on the neighboring hospital at 6am, and peered outside to see a dense mist forming a dark fog around the premises. The ubiquitous rain clouds had returned to their typical places, ready to set up camp for another few weeks, I’m sure.

As the morning turned into afternoon and the clouds refused to offer any hope of breaking, I did what is often a good remedy for dark, rainy days: I made some good food. Leftover spaghetti? Thank you very much. Garlic, cheesy toast to go with it? Yes, of course. Find a good recipe to work on this afternoon? Sounds like a marvelous idea. After all, if the weather is heavy and the tundra is looking particularly damp, a kitchen full of supplies is an excellent source of entertainment—and certainly worth appreciating.

Now to decide on a recipe…

Wednesday's blue skies, which were suprisingly replicated Thursday evening as well...

Journey to Rural Alaska: Have and Have Nots

2011-07-27T11:08:00.000-08:00

Trips away from home are always a good reminder of what I have that I normally take for granted—be it gas for less than $6 a gallon, or milk for less than $9. Cost of goods aside, there are still a lot of little things that cause me to appreciate the details of my everyday life that I don’t normally notice.

Take the temperature of water in the shower, for example. Taking a shower here is cause to get a bit nervous because the temperature swing is extreme. The first time I experienced the scalding jump I leapt onto the edge of the tub and used the shower curtain as a shield to protect my burning legs. I have since picked up on the slight decrease in water pressure that precedes the temperature jump. This has saved me much internal screaming, though the length of my current showers will make any water conservationist proud.

Also going to be appreciated when I return home? A general value for aesthetics. The apartment we live in, while bigger than our condo, and two floors to boot, feels a lot like a dorm. This is probably due to the weathered couch, mismatched furniture, drooping curtain rods and other window coverings merely thumb-tacked to the wall.

The wall decorations are a generous smattering of posters by a Californian photographer who likes to capture Alaskan landscapes and wildlife. Creepy bear picture? Check. Mt. McKinley? Check. Sunset over mountains? Check. I think all the classic Alaskan photography bases are covered. Also in attendance? Burnt orange counter tops and dark wood cabinets, circa 1973.

Even with the lacking décor and unpredictable water temperature, it’s impossible to complain about the location. Not only are we a (literal) stone’s throw from Curtis’s work, we are also right off the boardwalk—a system of wooden sidewalks that are stilted above the tundra. These offer a more scenic route than the shoulder alongside the road, not to mention you don’t have shield your eyes from dirt getting thrown up by passing vehicles.

Yet the biggest surprise I have found while being away is my enjoyment of a lack of cell phone service. Sure, I have the internet, and online communication keeps me more than connected to what is going on back home and beyond, but the absence of one more device that is tied to me when I go out has been refreshing. When we head out on walks, no one can get a hold of us. When we are visiting with neighbors, no one can interrupt. I feel like I’m pretty liberal in my ability to ignore calls until it is convenient to return them, but just knowing that there aren’t any calls or texts to get back to can be freeing. And perhaps the biggest factor is that most people know they can’t get in touch with me except through online communication, and so whatever would normally be important or urgent is inevitably put on hold.

When Curtis and I were at the campout last month we ended up talking for a while to the resident that had just finished this rotation, asking her about everything from what to bring to what her experience was like. She made an offhanded comment about feeling so overwhelmed in being back, so many people, so much busyness, it just felt like a lot to her.

I guess I will probably feel a little bit of the same, even though I have not been here for the whole term. There is an absence of duties in being away, and even in the midst of potential boredom it feels like a bit of a vacation. Sure, most people don’t head off to rainy tundra when they have time off, but getting out of town and away from it all is relaxing no matter where you end up—even if it’s surrounded by dorm décor and posters with curling corners. It is no resort, but at least it has a lot of personality.

Journey to Rural Alaska: Unexpected Discoveries

2011-07-25T09:19:00.000-08:00

One of the parts I enjoy most about being in a place I have never been is exploring: looking around, taking in the scenery—both creator and man made. Head a few hundred miles West in Alaska and you find a place that looks nothing like “stereotypical” Alaska: flat, open land. Many villages throughout rural Alaska are set up on rivers, and this one is no different. Before planes, the water was the primary means of travel. It takes you out to the ocean to fish or further inland to visit other villages. When it freezes it is still a valid highway, offering a route unencumbered by foliage—not that the tundra brush is much to be trifled with.

Curtis and I have ventured out on several adventure walks since I made my way in. We have walked to the grocery store, along the riverbank, and out into the tundra—flat wilderness that extends like farmland in the Midwest, as far as the eye can see.

It’s easy to happen on small treasures when we’re not looking for anything in particular: decorated dumpsters proclaiming inspiring messages, abandoned jeans in the midst of tundra with no apparent sign of ownership, a local teen burning letters not far from the post office, explaining with a smile to us that he has no interest in reading them.

Everywhere I go it is more than apparent that life in the village is unlike any place I have lived, from the grocery store prices that cause any casual out-of-towner to do a double take (or more) to the riverbank turned parking lot being occupied by more than a couple of boats. Everything is a bit more weathered, compliments of limited paved roads and freight costs that make cleaning seemingly futile and the simplest home improvement project impractical.

In the short time Curtis and I have been in the village it seems like everyone is eager to make a new friend, from the invitations to lunch after casual attendance at church, to a dinner late into the evening with the family of a man Curtis met at work. We may have been the only non Spanish speaking people in attendance, but the food was spectacular, the company was genuine, and English was spoken at least forty percent of the time.

There will be many things I will likely forget about this trip long after we have returned to our everyday routine. I hope that an appreciation for a slower pace and effortless community are not among them. To spend the afternoon in a pair of rubber boots wandering in open land—rain or shine—is more satisfying than I might have expected. And sharing a watermelon--which was referred to as costing $100, and honestly might not have been a joke—with two families I have never met, couldn’t understand half the time, and enjoyed a game of scrabble with nonetheless, was wonderful as well.

Clearly a visit to rural Alaska hardly makes me an expert, but it does reinforce what Curtis’s parents have been telling us for years—it is the people that make a place great. That Curtis and I can be so easily enveloped into the local culture—be it invitations to the weekly Latin dance class or bingo, dates with local runners at 5:30am along the river bank, or a bilingual dinner to share expensive produce and international cuisine—is a testament to the warmth that exudes from this rainy, wind-battered place.

Rural Alaska is facing a lot of challenges right now from education to employment to the ways that subsistence and traditional village living is threatened. Yet there is no question that despite these modern challenges this town still embraces a value for people above possessions, quick to share what they have to offer with those around them—even if only there for a visit. Perhaps this is the best treasure to be found out here in the wilderness, where the appearance can be deceiving to so many from the outside, and a visitor can’t even come close to predicting what there is to be found.

Journey to Rural Alaska: 150 pounds & a lot of free time

2011-07-21T15:59:00.002-08:00

When the plane landed and the passengers began to depart, there had already been several things making this trip different than usual. First? The front half of the plane was devoted to cargo—windows non-existent, stairway up to the rear of the plane, all of which worked to all passengers to check three fifty pound bags free of charge (well, let’s just say it was included in the price of admission).

Packing and planning for this trip (both mine and Curtis’s) started weeks ago, both in planning for food and dress. One day we sat in the kitchen and sketched out a rough menu plan. Figuring fifty pounds would be gear, that left the other 100 for food, drinks, and any other item we didn’t want to purchase at exorbitant prices out in what could officially be called “the middle of nowhere”.

We aimed for themes: Mexican food options, Italian food options, Mediterranean was unfortunately nixed when things started getting to heavy, but a little bit of Asian food made the cut. Produce, perhaps the most over-priced, low-quality item barely available in the bush (the name Alaskans use to refer to anywhere off the beaten path in Alaska, which usually means you have to fly to it), is hard to bring in any large quantities because it’s delicate and doesn’t keep as long as all the processed goods.

Our first shipment went in with Curtis, who left two weeks before me, and included all sorts of goods from tortillas to spaghetti sauce to trail mix to pre-packaged orange chicken. After he was sent off, we had an accumulation of goods that didn’t make the cut: a couple pounds of pasta, a package of pita chips, four cans of tuna. After he evaluated the pantry at the apartment given to him to stay in while out of town we reevaluated my drafted list again: there was already plenty of pasta, some baking staples, lots of peanut butter but no jelly.

While I packed on Tuesday for the trip, I was constantly adding and removing items as the weight limit loomed in the balance. Add a book, take away a can of tuna; add a raincoat, remove a can of refried beans. It’s a funny thing planning at the mercy of a weight limit, and my back will likely remind me for the next several days that lifting fifty pound bags on and off a scale repeatedly is not the kindest thing I have ever done for it (even if I was trying to lift with my legs). It reminded me of the often cited hypothetical question "If you were headed to a deserted island and could only bring three things with you..." Except in this case I was headed to a place cut off, and 150 pounds was all I could take.

After landing, meeting up with Curtis and gathering the bags to the car, we made our way to his apartment. Because of the travelling nature of many people that work at this hospital, they have housing available nearby that is roughly furnished and decorated (more on that later), available to the many employees that come and go. And when I say the housing is nearby, I mean it is literally right next door. There’s a cute little boardwalk that leads from the complex to the hospital, and driving from one to the other would undoubtedly take longer than walking.

Interesting fact about the apartment complex? Curtis’s parents, who lived in this same small town for a decade, had their children here, and worked at this same hospital--they lived for a few years in the apartment right next door. It’s funny to try and picture how things were different thirty years ago, and funnier still to realize that there was no way to predict when they were young and on an adventure that thirty years later their son would return to this same place—literally right next door.

I am interested to see how these next couple weeks turn out, living in a tiny town cut off from society with a laptop, a stack of books, an online class and some curriculum materials. I can be pretty good at entertaining myself and keeping busy, but two weeks is a lot of running, reading and thinking. In some ways I think it will be good to slow down, to be cut off and free to wander and explore. In other ways I am a person that thrives on productivity and here there are no mountains to climb, no walls to paint, and no errands to run. It’s just me, the sound of the rain on the boardwalk, and the far off buzz of the hospital.

Perhaps it will be cleansing to be away from it all for a while.
Perhaps it will make me appreciate all I have.
Either way, two weeks of anything can’t be that bad...
...just requiring a bit of patience and creativity, and a pantry full of food.

I've Been Everywhere With You (Except When I Haven't)

2011-07-20T01:10:00.003-08:00

Curtis, meticulously packing his bags with exactly fifty pounds of goods...

I’ll follow you into the park, through the jungle, through the dark

Girl, I never loved one like you

Moats and boats and waterfalls, alley-ways and pay-phone calls

I’ve been everywhere with you, that’s true

Laugh until we think we’ll die, barefoot on a summer night

Never could be sweeter than with you

And in the streets we’re runnin’ free like it’s only you and me

Jeez, you’re somethin’ to see

Home, let me come home

Home is wherever I’m with you…

-Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros, “Home”

Less than a year after Curtis and I were married, we spent over a week apart. I have often heard many a romantic story about the couple who “never spent more than a night apart”, but this hasn’t really worked out in our marriage, and that was a trend set early in our relationship.

Though we went to the same college and competed on the same team, our school year togetherness was a stark contrast to our summers apart. Many of our friends assumed, given our common home state, that we saw each other often throughout the summer months. The reality? Curtis lived on an island, and I wasn’t pulling in the “big bucks” it took to get out there. (Can we say airline monopoly? Yes we can.)

Money aside, flying out to an island (or into the city) would have been a pretty big statement about the seriousness of our relationship, one that wasn’t going to be made lightly, and thus the summers were spent emailing and writing letters, with a weekly phone call that lasted far longer than either of our non-phone-talking personalities should have been able to handle.

Then, we got married.

Spending every night together? The norm perhaps, but not without exception. The reality of medical school is that it is all consuming, and with a school calendar offering me a summer of possibilities, I wasn’t going to pass up an extra week with my family, or a weekend away with friends for the sake of camping at our apartment to soak up the twenty free minutes Curtis might have when he got home from work for the night.

Call me independent; I’m just not that girl.

Thus, even in our first year, we split up from time to time. I went to Florida to chaperone a senior trip. He stayed in Alaska an extra week to finish a rotation while I had to report back for the school year. I travelled hours away to boat and play with my friends. These separations were typically accompanied by phone calls and sentiments of missing one another, but not enough to call off the trips altogether.

And then there was Duluth.

In the midst of Curtis’s fourth year of medical school he travelled a lot to interviews and rotations literally all over the country. I went to visit whenever possible, but on a tight budget and a rigid school schedule the visits left something to be desired in the midst of us being just tired of being apart. One two week rotation found Curtis driving seven hours home so that we could be together for 24 hours on Easter weekend, a time when it was just depressing for both of us to be separated. But that two-week hiatus felt like nothing compared to the three-week monster that happened in December of 2009. You know all those wonderful holiday social activities that happen after Thanksgiving? He missed all of them thanks to a rotation 1,000 miles away that stretched from Thanksgiving to nearly Christmas.

It was after this that we determined we needed to add a caveat to our previously loved freedom: We like having the freedom to be apart…but not when it’s a really long time, and not when one of us is stuck in the middle of nowhere.

This summer has proved to be our biggest time apart yet, with Curtis being out of town for eight weeks, and me being with him for two weeks of it. His departures weren't terribly negotiable, with six weeks being required and two weeks being a “really great learning opportunity.” The non-negotiable six-week stint happened to be in a rural Alaskan village that you have to fly to. The good news? Someone pays for spouses to fly out and visit (think: future recruiting). The bad news? It’s out in the middle of nowhere, and this girl likes to keep busy.

And so, I am off: anxious to be reunited with my long lost husband, feeling like over a month apart (with a brief stint of togetherness in the middle) is more than either of us can even pretend to like, and ever confused about whether I love or hate Skype, which provides grainy, delayed communication that both energizes and frustrates me—sometimes at the same time.

I have 150 pounds to pack (mostly food, some clothes, and several books), and an adventure or two to find. The way I see it, the worst-case scenario will find me bored out of my mind, finished with all of my books and the two credit online course that I am saving for this trip, and anxiously watching out the window for Curtis to arrive home from the hospital for the day so that I can have some company.

If the end of the day finds me under the same roof as Curtis, I will happily endure the boredom that it costs to find that--at least for a little while. As much as I love being in my own house, with the freedom for projects and adventures and dates with friends, there is little that can compete with coming home to my husband wherever he may be, rural Alaskan village, stale bland apartment and all.

Wanted: Neighborly Love

2011-07-19T01:10:00.001-08:00

See, neighbors 3? We like dogs...even ones that wake us up in the middle of the night.

Curtis and I are people that like neighbors, that value community, that feel like it’s important to know those around you, and that these relationships can really enhance the value and experience in a place. And whether that place is work or church or home, we like to know the people around us.

In our last home, we had three neighbors in our building.

Neighbor 1: Owner, landlord, collector of rent and fixer of broken garbage disposals. He and his longtime girlfriend traveled frequently and were often absent, but when he was around he loved a good conversation. Curtis is patient and good at participating in conversations at inopportune times. It’s not really my strong point.

Side Note: Curtis is an excellent listener; it’s one of my favorite things about him. He can hear someone ask a question, listen while someone else takes the conversation a completely different direction, follow that direction to its conclusion and then turn to the formerly ignored person and follow up—“You were asking about ______? Tell me more about….”

Neighbor 2: Basement dweller, giver and receiver of brief and polite “hello’s”, once got his car vandalized by former enemies which made me really sad. He even apologized when mis-sprayed mustard ended up on my driver side door.

Neighbor 3: Moved in a month after we did and stayed beyond our three years, the grandfather of one of our college acquaintances, offered us bottled water and the use of his big screen television (and cable) knowing we had none. A widower, he would often bring home “lady friends” from church to spend time with on Sunday afternoons. Occasionally he would ask me to rewrite letters for him because he didn’t like his handwriting and he wanted these lady-friends to know that every detail mattered. We always let each other know if we’d be out of town, and Curtis and I would bring him down a serving of our dinner if he was home alone. Even as a chronic cough echoed up through the ceiling to our apartment into the night, it was nice to know he was alive and well, holding down the first floor while we made our lives up on the second.

And then there were the next-door neighbors, a couple with two kids. I always loved when they would come out and play while I was out reading on the lawn or washing the car. The children would tiptoe onto our oversized driveway/parking lot and inevitably be called back by their parents or sitter. And I would watch them play in the sandbox, and color on their miniature table, and explore the bits of nature they could find in a domesticated neighborhood.

So what about now?

Nearly a year in, Curtis and I regularly comment on the disappointment we find in our lack of community. We share a building with three sets of neighbors, and instead of knowing two of our neighbors well and one of them “sort-of”, we know one of them sort-of-well, one of them “sort-of” and one of them not at all.

Neighbor 1: Greeted us when we were moving in and was thrilled when we struck up a brief conversation with her. This should have been our first clue that this wasn’t the norm. Six months later, Curtis discovers they both work at the hospital, long after we began telling her when we’d be out of town, where we work, what our story is. She tells us we are the first friendly people to live in the building.

Neighbor 2: Greeted us briefly a couple weeks after moving in. We have mandatory conversation from time to time due to his very large truck blocking our garage storage closet, but he (and his often visiting girlfriend) are nice and quiet. Also, they say hi when we inevitably run into them in the stairwell (an important fact regarding in considering neighbors 3).

Neighbors 3: A couple and their dog live in our building. He has a company car, which tells us where he works, and she is home a lot, which I know from being home a fair amount during the summer. He helped us jump our car once, which was really nice, but other than that we have had zero contact with them. Interesting fact? I always say hi whenever I see them, and they never say a word back—either of them. This has become a bit of a game for me, because I feel like this is slightly abnormal and I am determined to get one of them to crack.

Side Note: One of Curtis’s coworkers asked (after being told about the lack of communication with neighbors 3) if perhaps they were deaf. This is a good theory, except that I have heard them talking to each other.

Perhaps we are beyond the age of valuing neighbors and communities and people that are physically present. Perhaps our virtual and transient communities are what we have come to depend on, and knowing the people that you share walls or ceilings or driveways or garages with is abnormal and outdated.

Yet, I’m disappointed. I want to know Neighbor 3’s career, why she’s always home, what kind of dog they have and why he always barks. I want to know neighbor 2’s latest career plans (alluded to briefly in conversation months ago), and who was talking outside our building last night, out of view but not earshot, about moving.

Curtis has mentioned that we should give Neighbors 3 baked goods, to try and strike up a conversation. I guess I have trouble investing time in some sort of bread or pastry to give to a couple of people that clearly want nothing to do with me. Why else would they repeatedly snub polite greetings every time they are offered?

My mom has often told me the story of going to the grocery store with me when I was a small child, when I would say "hi" to every shopper that passed. If ignored, I would escalate my volume, crane my neck and continue vocally pursuing that particular customer until they paid me heed or left my line of sight.

I have yet to see any small children play outside our current condo. I rarely see people hanging around outside when I read, or wash my car, or walk in and out of my building to and from my car. Perhaps this is what I get for living in a modern day invention: the condo complex. Perhaps I should let go of my childhood need for everyone I speak to, to respond. Or perhaps I am not too proud to acknowledge that I can’t do life on my own, that the people around me matter, that in this life we need other people.

Maybe neighbors 3 already have people to take care of them, so many people that they couldn’t possibly invite any more acquaintances in their lives. Even so, I’m not convinced we don’t have something else to offer these silent people that they don’t already have…even if it is just baked goods.

Recent Reads: Part III

2011-07-17T12:29:00.004-08:00

It’s hard to believe it’s been three months since I last reported on readings, and a lot of reading has been done since then. Though several articles and a couple fifty page booklets were involved in my recent class, none of them were so significant that they worth posting here. So here are the books yet completed (or in progress):

Touching Spirit Bear, By Ben Mikaelsen
This book is part of the curriculum I taught this past school year, in the midst of the chaos of finishing the school year and trying to manage track season. I really loved this book, which was handed to me the week before the quarter and highly suggested. If you want to read a story about a very troubled teenager, a dysfunctional home, and a couple adults that advocate for healing and processing instead of traditional justice, this is a great fit. There is a bear mauling, island isolation, and a title that doesn’t do it justice. I highly recommend it.

Another Culture, Another World, By Father Michael Oleksa
This was the flagship book for my latest grad school class, which I finished this past weekend. Cross cultural communication is important in most parts of the country these days, but even in out-of-the-way Alaska we deal with more cultures than just about anywhere else in the country. Our minority percentage is a far cry from “highest”, but if you look at different cultures present, some would say we win. Alaska is a crossroads of cultures native to this area and those thousands of miles away, which is why it’s so important to think about the ramifications of our communication styles.

Freedom, by Jonathan Franzen

I finally finished this novel (after much prompting from Ms. LaPointe, who also read the book as part of our unofficial two person "book club", and then went on to finish it months before I did) , which turned out to be a good summer read. I’ve heard a lot of mixed reviews about the book, which got quite a bit of press when it came out last year. I will say I’m somewhere in the middle: it’s not my favorite book, but I am a sucker for depressing books about dysfunctional families that find bits of redemption in the end. This is 600 pages in a nutshell.

Animal Farm, by George Orwell

I had actually never read this classic before this week. I am teaching it next year, and while I (obviously) like to read things before I teach them, I rather enjoyed plowing through it in less than 24 hours. It’s about 100 pages, and is quite comical in how obvious the historical critique is being played out by animals in your not-so-typical farm. We’ll see how astute the teenagers will be on “getting” this.

Currently Reading: Caribou Island

This is what I’m currently working through, on lazy days when I don’t feel like devoting my life to baseboards. Set in Alaska on a lake I spent some time on just a couple weeks ago, I’m curious to see how it all plays out. Word has it (from my fellow book club members) that the author is making it up here this fall, and we may get to hear from him.

Currently Listening: My Sister, My Love

Joyce Carol Oates has long been one of my favorite authors, ever since I read one of her short stories my senior year in high school. We Were the Mulvaneys, which I read while chaperoning a senior trip back in 2007, and Black Girl/White Girl, which I read while piecing a quilt the same year, continued to endear me to her after college. Her writing can be dark, but is very real, and she does an amazing job approaching social and moral dilemmas without presuming to solve them. This particular book, chosen because it was readily available on CD at the library, and I needed something to accompany my painting project, will not be my favorite. Still, it raises some very interesting ideas that I find myself thinking about even when her narration is finished.

Sharing Our Gifts

2011-07-15T01:23:00.002-08:00

When my sister was in college, I would periodically get phone calls about papers she was working on for her various classes. She would tell me about the latest research she was doing on gothic architecture, on early American slave literature, or on so-and-so, the very controversial artist. Thanks to modern technology, she would email the 8-10 page creations, which I would peruse and mark with electronic notes before sending them 3,000 miles in seconds, back in time to meet her deadlines.

When I would tell my students about the importance of editing their work, I would strongly encourage them to find someone (preferably someone better than themselves) to read and evaluate their work before turning it into me. “Writers depend on editors” I would assure them “no matter their level or talent.” And then I would tell them about the latest work my sister had sent to me—and they would raise their hands in protest.

“She can’t let you edit her papers; that’s cheating.”
“Why?”
“You’re an English teacher; that’s not fair.”
“I’m not writing anything for her; I’m not changing her work. I’m making suggestions on how to improve it. She’s a perfectly good writer all on her own, I’m just helping with the details.”

Writing and editing is a gift I enjoy sharing, with my sister while she was in college, with my brother who is still in high school, with my husband who had to write a lot of carefully worded essays to get into medical school and then residency, with our good friends who were doing the same. I’ve helped construct my mom’s Christmas letter for ages. I have worked on resumes and cover letters and applications for all sorts of friends, readings for church, and recommendation letters for scholarships. Every time I get an opportunity to assist I feel like it’s a gift I can offer, and one that certainly doesn’t need payment.

In due time, everything comes around. My sister, now out of college as a professional photographer, spent hours last week taking beautiful photographs for our anniversary. My mom helped us work through the purchase of a house. Curtis diagnosed me with “the common cold”, and saves me a trip to the doctor’s office…or just curiosity.

I often sense, in the classroom and the media and everywhere else, that our society is focused on what can be gained from a situation—wondering “what is in it for me.” While I am surely guilty of selfish motives, I find such little satisfaction in looking for payment in what could have been a gift. For though there is much time invested in writing and editing for others, there is also much to be gained—learning about famous artists and architecture, discovering my brother’s perspective on Dante’s Inferno, catching up on what happened in our family while I’ve been out of town, and dialoguing with my husband about why he is so passionate about his career choice.

Yes, giving up time to share talents and gifts is a sacrifice, but it often turns out to be a rewarding gift as well—even if it’s often intangible.

Summer Traditions: Projects

2011-07-13T22:44:00.001-08:00

Ten months ago when we moved into our condo, it was in the midst of a school year, a coaching season, and Curtis’s ridiculous schedule at the hospital. There were a couple things about the condo that I didn’t love from the beginning, but the biggest one seemed to stare me in the face at all times: the trim.

I’m not sure whose idea it was, but at some point the trim of the condo was painted a “lovely” color to set off the white walls and gray carpet—mauve. I noted it immediately when we looked at the condo the first time, but obviously didn’t shy away from the purchase on account of someone’s taste in paint color. It could easily be taken care of—eventually.

With the exception of the painting done in the second bedroom (which I was inspired to do on one random Sunday afternoon) the rest of the place had not been touched all year. Now that it was summer and my travels had slowed down, my desire for trim that was not pale pink grew, though it mixed with the premonition that this would be a long and tedious project.

My gut was right.

A couple weeks ago I put in seven hours coloring our living and dining area, with the another two being invested on baseboards. With a brief hiatus for a holiday weekend and a couple camping adventures, I have been working on finishing the room both of the last two days, spending two hours painting the last large wall, and another four on baseboards and door and window frames.

Every day I proudly show off my progress to Curtis, noting windows and doorways now flanked in bright white. It would be hardly noticeable to someone not haunted by mauve for the last ten months, but it is crisp and clean to me—having spent hours fixing the room up and making it my own.

Home ownership seems to be this lofty, sought-after ideal in our current society, but like all grown-up responsibilities it comes with some effort. We may have had white walls in our old apartment, but I also didn’t spend twenty hours painting them. When something breaks, I no longer get to pass along the information (and bill) to an outside party to take care of my problems. When a dent or crack forms, I know I’m going to be the one fixing it.

At the same time, the home is ours—sage walls, white trim and all. And if I want to spend hours and hours with the windows open, the crisp Alaskan summer air rushing through while I paint, I can. And if I want to spend many of the next 24 hours reading a book start to finish, I can. For summer—with all its flexibility—is fleeting. And responsibility of a different kind will knock on my door soon enough once again.

(But at least this time, the doorframe will be white.)

Making the Guest List

2011-07-11T23:47:00.000-08:00

How to Ensure You’re Invited to a Little Mermaid Birthday Party:
1) Hang out with child from the very beginning, starting with trips to the NICU when said child is born six weeks early, three days after your wedding.
2) Continue visits as child grows, including impromptu visits after school/practice, morning visits before school when the child’s mom needs a latte but loading up three small kids is out of the question, and summer visits that sometimes last all afternoon.
3) Play many rounds of mama dinosaur/baby dinosaur, encourage the learning of Frisbee, and sip many cups of hypothetical tea from 1oz plastic cups with matching saucers.
4) Always be open to another round of reading a book, refereeing a race, or watching yet another variation of a summersault.

Rumor has it I made Spiderman’s guest list for next month. I have to admit, I’m pretty excited.

Summer Traditions: Camping

2011-07-09T20:16:00.000-08:00

I slept in a hammock on Wednesday and Thursday night, a tent hammock this is. I woke periodically throughout the night to the sounds of squirrels scurrying beneath me, birds fluttering in the branches and people walking the gravel road nearby as they travelled throughout the campground. Sure, it wasn’t the typical comfort of home, but a couple nights in the wilderness is certainly worth passing up modern amenities, like protection from bear and squirrels in the night.

A visit from out-of-state guests is always a good reason to make plans for out-of-town adventures, whether it’s my own guests or people I’ve never met. In this case it was the latter, and when the packed Subaru pulled into my drive to add my sleeping bag and pad to an already stuffed trunk, the two strangers made room for my gear while my friend introduced me to her high school classmates. It was their first trip to this great land, and while they’d already spent a few days in the interior on bear sighting and wildlife adventures, attention was shifting to the aquatic side of the nature spectrum and we headed for the coast.

Day One: Hike a glacier…or rather, near one. The eight mile round trip hike up the mountain paralleling a major glacier and ice field proved a to be a six hour journey that drained our water bottles and found us exhausted enough to bed back in our hammocks by 9pm. The weather was spectacular, with glimpses of sun and a steady breeze off the glacier to keep us cool. Most of the second half of the hike was on a trail of snow and slush, still dense and expansive even in the middle of July.

Day Two: Tour the other glaciers…and various wildlife. While the previous night’s early bedtime was due to exhaustion of climbing over 3,000 vertical feet, the next morning came early with a need to clean up the site and travel into town in time to make it on the tour boat at 8:30am. With nine hours of ocean travel ahead of us, I popped a seasickness pill and hoped for the best. Thankfully the waves were kind and when my stomach started to turn for the worse we found a calm patch nestled in a cove.

After staring in awe hour after hour at whales and birds, glaciers and porpoises, I am almost ashamed that it took out of state visitors to find me on such a trip. I see a lot of gorgeous wildlife and scenery in everyday life in Alaska, but setting aside a full day on a boat when the primary goal is wildlife observation and appreciation (and you have a seasoned captain to guide your tour and inform your view in everything from geology to ornithology) was well worth the investment.

All in all the trip was more than successful, it was nearly perfect. We spent the days outside in sun and wind and rain, cooked dinner over a campfire while reliving the day’s adventures, lounged on a rocky beach at the edge of our campground while the evening sun flickered on the waves, and disconnected ourselves from society for a while at a campsite without cell-service. And at the end of each day as I fell asleep to the rocking of my hammock, I would mentally settle in for the night: Hat? Check. Gloves? Check. Bear spray? Check. Another great day of summer? Absolutely.

Oblivion

2011-07-06T10:22:00.000-08:00

My eyes are swollen and itchy this evening, thanks no doubt to the generous supply of cottonwood I swam through on my evening run, picking it out of my eyelashes, blowing it out of my nose. Yet, I can hardly complain.

It has been a beautiful day, with hours to play with my friend’s small children, to sit on the deck and sip lemonade, to take walks with strollers and bikes with training wheels.

And when the play date was over, and I was headed home from the evening, I couldn’t help but recognize how far life has come. I never would have guessed as an insecure junior higher spending the night at a friend’s house that someday her children would invite me to their birthday parties, dance with me to Adele’s latest hit, and humor me while I try to throw decent pitches at their ready bats.

During summer days when I am not travelling I oscillate between feeling productive and lazy, between feeling fulfilled and frustrated. I always have a long list of projects and tasks, but sometimes I have the unmistakable urge to throw it all out of the window in favor of playing outside. And if anyone knows how to soak up summer sun, oblivious of time or responsibilities, it is a couple of red-headed four year olds who know that “Ash” is always up for anything.

Campout: Take II

2011-06-30T15:57:00.001-08:00

In the midst of Saturday's hike...

One year ago I flew in on a red-eye flight, squeezed in a couple hours of jet-lagged sleep, and headed out to the annual resident campout. It was rainy and cold (by Ohio standards), and my sleep-deprived state did little for my love (read: disdain) for surface chit-chat.

Unfortunately, most relationships start with surface chitchat. 36 hours of rain later, Curtis and I headed away from the campsite and compared mental notes. “So-and-so seemed nice.” “Yeah. What’s-her-name’s husband is a teacher.” “I know…and the other girl’s husband couldn’t find a teaching job.” Basically Curtis knew everyone’s name from two weeks of orientation, and I was trying to match people to names based on hair, height, camping attire and dogs.

The gal with the green coat had two kids and was married to a lawyer.
The guy with the two wolfish dogs and two equally crazy kids was wearing a hat from a Midwestern college team.

Instead of dreading the onslaught of small talk this year, I looked forward to meeting up with people I hadn’t seen in several weeks and months, due to busyness, travel, and life. The weather was agreeable, with rainy spells only occurring in the middle of the night or late evening, and though the constant light dispelled by the tent nylon made for less than constant sleep throughout the night, the excitement of getting up to have breakfast and lunch and dinner, and hiking with people who are my friends (rather than strangers), made me feel like I was back at summer camp, away from home and free to play and share stories.

In real life, we have jobs and responsibilities that keep us from staying up late at night playing volleyball on a sand court with a beach ball, playing rounds and rounds of catch phrase around a campfire, and hiking for hours in the wilderness with a backpack full of snacks and a couple cans of bear spray. At the campout, everyone is off for the weekend, and the number one goal is unsaid but felt deeply: develop relationships and be rejuvenated.

As we pulled out of the campsite this past weekend, headed back for Curtis to catch an overnight shift, we couldn’t help but comment on how far we had come: one year, arguably the worst of residency, nearly completed. This year has been one that is very full: new jobs for both of us, new friendships established and old ones renewed, a condo purchased, a community established.

Today we will attend the residency graduation and bid farewell to a class of doctors that will head off on their own professions, officially done with training as they readily admit how much more they have to learn. Many of them have trips planned for personal solace and renewal before starting their official careers, and all would admit they are ready to go out and be independent of a program or schedule where they are slaves to the hospital.

Today as I watch the slideshow and socialize with guests I will have one eye fixed on the future that will soon approach, a graduation in two years that will come with many decisions about who and what and where. The other eye will be remembering how far we have come and how quickly it has passed, because even as this year has been exhausting and grueling, it has gone quickly.

And two years from now, two campouts from now, the people graduating will be us.

Summer Traditions: Hiking Adventures

2011-06-24T09:24:00.000-08:00

Taken back in college, when the clouds weren't quite as thick...

I found myself clawing at a muddy surface as I slid backward down a wet slope this evening. My shoes had failed me, and the late onset of rain had left the lower half of the mountain quite slick and me wondering if the hike I had voluntarily signed up for still qualified as fun.

Yesterday I went running on some local trails with a friend I used to train with in high school. It was good to catch up, and when she mentioned she’d be hiking one of the local peaks today I jumped on the opportunity. After all, I have a flexible schedule and if there’s anything better than hiking in the wilderness, it’s having good company for the journey.

It didn’t occur to me until I was parked at the trailhead that this old high school friend of mine—who is currently a competitive mountain racer—was going to end up dragging me up and then back down the mountain. Hiking is one of my favorite summer activities, but I haven’t been out much this year with all the busyness of the past month. Sure, this was a great opportunity that I couldn’t pass up—but it was going to come at a cost.

The hike started at a reasonable pace, running up and down grassy hills, weaving through devil’s club, and balancing on logs over muddy bogs. The sun was pushing through heavy clouds and it looked like it was going to turn into a gorgeous evening. As we made it further up the base, the grade grew steeper and we transitioned from running to a swift hike.

After almost an hour we made the turn to hike toward the peak, and at that point the promise of sunshine had long since disappeared. We were up in the midst of the clouds, droplets collecting on my forearms and eyelashes, keeping me cool while I struggled to keep up the pace. My legs were burning, my breathing was labored, and while it was clear that we were making progress, the peak seemed to grow nearer in a painfully slow manner—literally.

One hour and thirty minutes after we started, we reached the peak. The cloud that hovered around us seemed complete with the silence. We were wrapped in a tight canopy, far from the city, far from civilization, far from any other people or anything made by man. The only reminder of anyone else treading among the clouds was the peel from an orange resting on a rock nearby, crawling with ants eager for fresh produce so far from its normal habitat. And even as my muscles quivered and ached, there was no doubt that this was a sacred place, even as I was far from my own.

If not for the increasing wind and the growing size of the droplets, we might have stayed at the top of the mountain a bit longer, but it was growing cold. While my mountain running friend had set an ambitious pace up the mountain, at least I could keep up. On the way down? That was another story.

I’ve never been one to prance down mountains with fearless abandon, which is something that has often separated me from my Alaskan grown friends. I’m cautious, perhaps to a fault, and hate the moment I realize I have so much momentum I cannot stop if I want to. The building rain seemed to cloud my vision, and my muscles seemed to be teetering far too close to exhaustion. One misstep and my ankle might roll, my knee might buckle, my toe might catch—and whenever I envision a fall it always involves breaking off my two front teeth. This is what I pictured as I tried to concentrate on my footing, one eye ahead on the distance that was growing between us on our descent, the other on the switchbacks that wove back and forth up the slope.

Relief washed over me when we reached ground flat enough to run on without fearing a potentially tragic fall. And that’s when I noticed that the rain had done much more than cloud my vision on the steep decent; it had completely stripped all traction from the trail. Thus I found myself sliding down muddy hills, laughing inwardly at claw marks down the trail, reminiscent of a desperate cartoon character—hanging on against all odds.

The muddy slopes led back to the original undulating grassy hills, where we stumbled on several fresh bear and moose tracks pressed into the soft mud and hardly bothered to avoid sloshing through it over the top of them. There was no point by this time—we were already covered.

I tried to brush off residual dirt and mud when we returned to the trailhead, not wanting to carry the mountain away with me in my vehicle, and drove the mere five miles that exist between mountain and my front door. I stripped off my shoes and socks, grimacing at the chunks of mud accumulating in my entryway, while secretly loving the state of my filth. Less than thirty minutes after leaving the mountain I was scrubbed clean, in freshly laundered clothes, waddling around my house with my exhausted legs, examining the small cuts in the creases of my palm, the only visible evidence of my evening adventure.

By the time I climbed into bed, my legs ached a satisfying exhaustion that I feared would keep me awake all night even as my body craved rest. Yet I woke this morning to find my mud-caked shoes still resting outside my front door, my gait still awkward and disjointed as I descended the stairs, and I found myself wondering when I will make my way up a mountain again.

A large dose of exhaustion, dirt ground into my palms and under my fingernails, a few moments away from everything enjoying the simplicity of nature at its finest—these are things I love about summer.

Home Sweet Home

2011-06-20T00:14:00.000-08:00

Curtis using the boat to rescue a stray frisbee, when the glacial waters proved much too cold to swim out...

Last summer I came to appreciate the privilege of having a place to call my own after four months of suitcase packing and relocating. This summer, two weeks and two days away seem to have done the trick.

I flew back from Ohio last Friday, watching the sky fall to night and come back to life as we headed Northwest. Landing at nearly 2am, the sky still held streaks of fluorescent light reminding me (if I’d forgotten) one thing that Alaska would always hold over Ohio—the summer midnight sun.

Twelve hours after landing I was back on the road, on my way out of town to meet up with Curtis, who had flown back early to get back to work. After 4.5 hours of sleep at home (coupled with 4ish hours on the plane, interrupted regularly by an infant very displeased with this whole flying business), I was anxious to nest in my home again—if only for a few hours before heading out again.

The bathrooms were scoured, the bags unpacked, the clothes laundered and everything tidied. Post wedding packing two weeks prior had left me with few moments to reign in the chaos before heading out of town, and I had every intention of making up for lost time.

The weekend was wonderful, filled with good company and good weather, lazy mornings, generous meals and a rocky beach so warm I was wishing I had a swimsuit to lounge around in. We rescued Frisbees from freezing lakes, layered and braved the rain when the blazing sun was replaced with clouds and wind, and watched ducks corral their ducklings away from looming eagles.

I woke this morning to the sound of steady rain on a metal roof, and found myself making plans for the summer. The season started with whirlwind, continued with a vacation, and now I am ready to settle into productive projects I’ve been accumulating in my mind since we moved into our condo nine months ago.

As long as the weather isn’t 75 and sunny, I hope to make some serious progress.

So Comfortable

2011-06-14T06:54:00.001-08:00

I find myself sitting in the same place, one year later, both a same and different person. The trees have aged, died and come back to life. The seasons have come full circle, and I guess in a way so have I.

I am back, but only for a visit.

I feel at ease back in this town I lived in for eight years. This is where I became an adult, dated and married, procured my first job and started my first career. This is the place I learned to love cardinals and autumn leaves, a place I became my own person with my own thoughts, and a place where I will probably always have many friends and confidants.

This is a place I love.

I no longer live here, with all the variety of flora and fauna…I live far away, where moose wander up and down the road and mountains flank my existence. The seasons are very unbalanced, and the winter is beautiful and long. We bask in exhaustion through abundant sunlight and fight fatigue when the sun rises and falls between meals.

We are often asked if we will return to this Midwest place that moves on without us, and yet comfortably allows us to settle back in when we show up for the week. We don’t know the next time we will come to visit, let alone if we will ever move back. But we do know that it is a place that will always feel comfortable: where runs through neighborhoods and parks trace routes we know by heart, where every corner and shop seems to hold memories, and where an old house on an insignificant street holds an apartment that will always be “our first”.

We may be visitors in this place for the rest of our lives, but being a visitor doesn’t mean you can’t make yourself at home.

The Thrill of Travel

2011-06-10T11:06:00.001-08:00

Taken during our recent trip in Salt Lake, where a one hour layover turned into almost four--the perfect opportunity to enjoy overcooked chinese food, and frozen yogurt.

There is something exciting about getting away from it all: scheduled responsibilities, daily work, household necessities. In my experience it doesn't matter if I have big plans or a wide open schedule, it's nice to just "be" somewhere else.

One of my favorite parts about being away is flying--and I say this as someone that gets motion sick very easily. What's the draw of airplanes? Being completely cut off. Unless you are the elderly gentleman sitting next to me recently that kept his cell phone on to receive texts and send emails whenever a signal appeared, cell phones are out of commission for the entire flight. Until recently, internet was out of the question too. This mandatory technology hiatus has become a welcome time to check-out over the years: five hours to LA or Salt Lake, six to Chicago, eight to Atlanta...a long afternoon or evening to read without interruption, sleep if desired, watch a movie with scratchy audio or try to stave off sickness in the midst of turbulence.

In the technology infused age in which we live, every trip has a chance to begin with a bit of cleansing to think, reflect, listen to the baby cry in the back of the plane (or in my ear, if I'm back there). There's nothing appealing about being stuck in a germ-infested, inclosed environment except for this.

And whether or not I end up exiting the airplane with a tightly sealed bag, I hope the attraction of this time of seclusion never loses its charm.

What do I love about my life right now?

2011-06-06T09:37:00.000-08:00

Spending time with people I love, and haven't seen in a long time.

Playing with small children, in the water and on land, searching for "treasures" among rocks.

Staying up late, sleeping in or taking naps, finding rest in a slower pace with no pressure on productivity.

The warmth of the sun still glowing on my skin long after the sun goes down.

Days and days with Curtis, never sharing him with the hospital, no pager in sight.

It will be short-lived, but a vacation commencing after ten months of planning and schedule maneuvering leaves me feeling very content.

And Then There Were Ten

2011-06-01T01:09:00.000-08:00

A cake that tasted even better than it looks...hard to believe, I know.

Every year when I approach the summer I dream of all that will be accomplished: I will run more, write more, read more, sleep more, cook more, and just enjoy everything...more.

I realized today while biking back from my mom's house that it has been a week since I've sat down to write and there is one very good reason for the summer hiatus: a wedding. This past holiday weekend my mom married a wonderful man and our family of six has expanded into a family of ten. Many a flight, meal, and food preparation occasion later, the festivities have come to a close and the last of our visitors are flying out.

Even though writing has been neglected, there is one thing that has been happening in earnest: eating. If there is one thing our family can all rally and get behind, it's a good meal. There are so many plates and containers full of uneaten goodness I am almost sad that we are headed out of town very soon...

...but even massive amounts of food couldn't tempt me to stay. We're off to the Midwest to visit so many of those we left behind last June when we picked up to move. And spectacular weather or not, we're taking a break from all that makes Alaska summers amazing to get out and take a break.

Let the summer travels begin.

Summer Traditions: Bike Commuting

2011-05-24T23:09:00.000-08:00

On Monday the car sat in the garage…almost the entire day. We have been a one-car family since my brother got his driver’s license this spring and we handed over the beloved family suburban. Since then Curtis has been commuting to work via bike, and I have been silently jealous. Despite the muddy face and extra coordination that come with a bike commute, I often wish that I lived a bit closer to my work, or that my hair looked a bit better after being stuck in a helmet. Since neither of those is changing soon, I settle for biking all over the city while class is not in session.

This biking frenzy started (or rather resumed) the first day of in-service: bike to work day. I’m typically opposed to anything so stereotypical as biking to work the one day that everyone in the city is doing the same. It just so happened that I had decided to bike that day before I read that it was an official city event, before I heard that they were serving bacon at major intersections in town, and before I saw the t-shirts. I was biking because it was the first day that I didn't feel the need to dress professionally. Unfortunately, I didn't have the forethought to make a t-shirt to proclaim my circumstances to the countless passing cyclist.

I guess my motives don't need to be defended because the biking has continued this week: to the class I’m taking to keep my teaching license, to a friend’s house to visit, to Curtis’s work to meet him for dinner (where our bikes were locked up together on the rack, looking like quite the pair). It helps that the sun has been shining and the temperatures superb, but the reality is that this is a summer tradition for me. It started with sharing a vehicle with my siblings, continued when coming home for the summer from college found me vehicle-less as well, and now it is my favorite way to revel in a leisurely schedule.

When I bike, I know I have time to enjoy my surroundings, even if it’s rain. As long as we don’t break the rain record again this summer, I think the biking tradition will keep going strong.

It’s definitely one of my favorite summer things.

Thoroughly Satisfied

2011-05-23T22:21:00.000-08:00

Today, on my first official day of summer break, I spent the day in class. I spent eight hours inside, seated next to two story windows showcasing green, growing birch trees against a bright blue sky.

That’s right, folks. On the day where I could have been outside, I voluntarily spent it inside—all in the name of a teaching certificate.

The good news is that come 4:30 I was released to a day with plenty of daylight left, and after a quick phone call I had myself a hiking date. The day was gorgeous, the temperature perfect, and there was only one sighting of bear poop. As I drove home this evening, the sun still high in the sky and the air fresh, I felt like I might burst with satisfaction.

Even though I have to sit inside tomorrow for another eight hours and the temperature is expected to hit seventy, I certainly won’t be stressing about it. I will sleep well tonight with the warm glow of the sun still on my face, my legs weary.

And maybe tomorrow, I will do it all again.

Hello, Summer.

2011-05-21T09:17:00.000-08:00

Today is officially the first day of summer. Yesterday, classroom cleanup and organization followed Thursday’s final lessons. The students have been squirrelly all week, and between their high energy and my low energy (thanks to last weeks far too busy schedule, and Sunday’s triathlon) I found myself crawling into bed on more than one afternoon.

I. was. exhausted.

Today? I’m feeling energized. Curtis walked out the door for work by 8 and I was up doing laundry, emptying the dishwasher, organizing miscellaneous items and trying to resume a semblance of order at home. And that is when the dreaming begins: summer projects.

Summer projects were shafted last year due to our nomadic state, job hunting, and “the move”. I suppose I had lots of summer projects, they just weren’t the usual suspects: buy a condo, get hired, try to find _______ in any number of duffles/bags/locations. The constant rain put a damper on aspirations of outdoor adventures, though many an outing happened anyway.

More than anything I guess today is a day to look forward and back, take stock of where I’ve come from, and where I’m going. The summer will go quickly; it always does. In less than three months I’ll be unpacking the cabinets and drawers of my classroom and assembling the world of teaching once again.

Only then, I hope, I’ll have passed on this exhaustion and will feel refreshed.

Painful Perspective

2011-05-16T14:53:00.000-08:00

As if I didn't have enough things on my plate this past week and weekend, three months ago I signed up for the state's largest triathlon, and one of the largest female-only triathlons in the country—due to take place on Sunday.

My first triathlon since the summer after my senior year in high school, I have spent the last three months trying to find time to swim laps at the local pools, bike both inside and out, and squeeze in a run now and then. The training had been going pretty well until these past two weeks.

When forced to choose between sanity, sleep and training, training lost every time. Come yesterday afternoon when a 500 yard swim and an almost fourteen mile bike transitioned into a 5k run, I was feeling my lack of energy. My stomach cramped, my back ached, and mid-way through the run I was dry heaving. Eventually, I finished. It was a few minutes slower than my goal, but at the end of the day I was sure that it was all I had in the tank this time around.

Perhaps coaching, teaching, and just trying to maintain relationships took its toll on my athletic aspirations; when it comes to priorities in life right now, this just wasn’t it.

Looking back, the years that mark the difference between my first and second triathlon are significant. When I did the last one I was marking the months before starting my college running career. Athletics were very important to me, and perhaps I defined myself a bit too much by my accomplishments in that area. Sacrificing training and competition for anything wasn’t a decision I considered very often—if at all.

Personal goals are perhaps one of the easiest ways to trace priorities over time. They tend to be objective and measurable by nature, allowing the observer to consider what was the focus of energy—and what, by default was not. There is no question that what I value in 2011 is different than what I valued in high school. Though the changes are sometimes slight, they can come glaring to the surface at unexpected moments when I realize that a decision made would have played out differently not so long ago. And in that way perspective that comes with age can be welcome, even when it means that the task hurt that much more in the process.

New Rhythms

2011-05-13T18:17:00.000-08:00

And just like that, the season ends.

The jackets are returned; the hurdles are stored away. And in a couple days, all I have to show for it is a file of paperwork and face still flushed from wind and sun.

Three meets in one week is brutal on anyone’s energy level, but when the third day turned out with 60 degree warmth, a clear sunny sky, and barely a breeze, I found myself more than happy to spend hours in the infield of a track in shorts and sunglasses. We had some great performances, a couple photo finishes, and more than one disappointing finish. Yet, it’s easy to feel satisfied with a job that is challenging, but completed.

Perhaps the best part is that green arrived this week: in blades of grass still buried in a brown infield, in buds on the branches that are slowly coming to life, in the line on the horizon that used to be barren and sparse. It is lovely, and rejuvenating, and reminds me to seize the moment. One moment the trees are bare; the next they are exploding.

Blink, and snow may be back on the ground once again.

There is still much to be done between now and the end of the school year, now and the end of the month, now and our visit to the friends we left behind one short (and long) year ago. But this is a good life: teaching, track meets, soccer games, Sunday lunch with my family after church, catching up with Curtis while we bike the trails around town.

The tempo of my life will shift drastically in a week, from a meticulous schedule packed and overflowing to days with space and flexibility, free time, and options. Sometimes I struggle with this summertime existence, especially as I watch Curtis clock unhealthy amounts of hours at the hospital. Sometimes I revel in the beauty of reading in the sunshine, hiking my favorite trails, and preparing leisurely meals that take planning and organization.

Today while I folded laundry I stared at the trees outside my window and closed my eyes when the fresh air blew in the window. Cleaning up the piles that have accumulated during the week has become a Friday duty, trying to make space for a relaxing weekend, desperate to slow the pace for a few hours now and then. Next week will mark a new rhythm, and everything outside seems to be ready for the change.

I know I am.

That Kind of Week

2011-05-08T23:09:00.000-08:00

Evidence of summer: avocados on sale.

When I get to the end of a week and I haven't had a chance to write, it usually means one of two things: it has been extremely busy, or it has been extremely hard.

This week has been both.

Monday morning held a rude awakening when I found out that the mother of one of my friends unexpectedly passed away. I was driving down the highway on my way to school, admiring the sun rising above the mountains at such an early hour--a welcome change after a long, dark winter. All of the sudden the details of the sunrise didn't matter. I struggled to remember my lesson plans for the day, to communicate my plans for track practice, to eat my oatmeal before the first bell rang. Life stopped for a moment while I remembered what a delicate existence I really hold, and then it had to continue.

And continue it did...through the planning and execution of one track meet--held in four hours of steady rain--and the planning and paperwork for three more held this coming week. My cold continued, and my voice faded. A wedding shower was a smash hit, and news from another friend came, indicating her marriage seems headed for failure.

And next week will continue as well, with a funeral, three track meets, and picking up the pieces from any potential crises that have yet to appear. Maybe this week will be easier, maybe it won't. All I know is that when I get to Sunday after a week like this I find myself content to melt into the songs and words of sermons and hymns as they wash over me. I wish I could drag endless people in behind me on weeks like this, to experience the peace that comes from a faith in a plan that is bigger than my own, a faith in the redemption of situations that seem cruel. I enjoy so many things in this life that are rich and beautiful and deep, yet this is a very broken world--with intense hurts that we both choose for ourselves and those around us choose for us. And when I am knee deep in anguish for the pain that those I love are suffering through, I crave a life beyond my own, beyond this brokenness that will always exist this side of heaven.

Perhaps that craving should be nearer to me every week, on weeks that are beautiful and filled with satisfaction and beauty just as it is during weeks that are filled with trauma and pain. And yet perhaps that is the beauty of darkness. It takes months of dark days to bring me to appreciate the rich satisfaction of the early summertime sunrise. Yet during weeks like this, the sunrise is a welcome sign that winter has come to an end, just as it always does.

That Kind of Weekend

2011-05-01T17:09:00.000-08:00

Though most of the weekend was spent in bed with a box of tissues, there were some bright spots to be had. First? Our second bedroom is practically finished. The walls are a warm yellow, the baseboards a fresh white, and the windows freshly washed. Most of this was Curtis's doing while I alternated between folding laundry, and lying in the pile that formed on my bed. Sanitary, I know.

There is something hugely satisfying about cleaning up, clearing out and putting together a room, or watching someone do this for you. The fact that Curtis's parents are coming to stay with us this weekend may or may not have anything to do with the push to finish the project.

Second? Sunday afternoon was absolutely gorgeous. The sunny skies that taunted my congested body on Friday while I headed home to bed disappeared late in the afternoon and didn't reappear all day Saturday. I suppose Saturday's grey skies matched my disposition, but it didn't do much to lift my mood. I could not have been much more frustrated to be stuck in bed on a weekend where Curtis was off if I had tried. I pretty much alternated between sleeping and moping.

Third? On Sunday morning, as if in sync with the weather, my cold lifted. There is no doubt that I am still a snotty mess, but I am feeling rejuvenated, and able to be physically up and about without crashing into bed completely exhausted within the hour. An hour bike ride in the sun and wind almost made up for being cooped up 48 hours in advance. It also made heading into another busy week feel like a feat I can realistically accomplish.

I suppose weekends come in all different shapes and sizes: busy, slow, packed, empty, healthy, sick, lonely, and content. I'm just hoping that the weekend I happened on this time doesn't cycle back through for several months.

I much prefer the other kinds.

Out of Commission

2011-04-29T15:16:00.000-08:00

Curtis's biking coat...sloppy from a wet commute home.

After Tuesday's meet I was duly exhausted, but on Wednesday morning it became apparent that the exhaustion was beginning to manifest itself as a cold. In an effort to prevent what was clearly becoming inevitable, I laid in bed for twelve hours after a full day of work and practice.

And the cold got worse.

On Thursday, after a full day of work and practice, the idea of climbing back in bed for a twelve hour stint was appalling, despite my worsening cold. It was a gorgeous day outside: blue skies, light breeze, temperatures in the fifties. A friend called for a last minute running date and I couldn't turn her down. After a "short" run (to be kind to my cold) turned into six miles, I felt invigorated. Once home, I jumped on the bike to accompany Curtis on his run, only my second ride of the spring. The fresh air made my congestion seem to disappear. Unfortunately, as soon as I made it inside to work on dinner, I realized that perhaps two rounds of outside activity was not going to be the best treatment. I crashed in bed and could feel my congestion worsen, a pile of used tissues growing by my bed.

The cold was full force, now.

Today I made it to school only to turn around and come home half day. I was a snotty mess, and making it through a full day was going to be nothing short of miserable, not to mention probably not going to help me get any better. I made it home by noon, climbed into bed, and quickly began working through the tissue as I struggled to sleep.

Hello, weekend. Good thing I didn't have any pressing plans.

Sometimes I don't know what to do when I can sense my body is failing me. Rest? Get fresh air? Keep going with life? Stop everything? It seems, at times, that the cold will do what it wants regardless of how I curtail my schedule to appease it, and that frustrates me. I like to know that my efforts work toward meaningful results. In the mean time, I will watch the weather forecast and dream of unclogged sinuses and a full tank of energy.

I've been waiting too long to see all this beautiful spring weather go to waste.

Missing: Couch, Gloves, Rain

2011-04-27T10:47:00.000-08:00

Taken last Saturday, when I was finally able to make a game...

When I looked in the mirror yesterday night, I couldn't tell if I was sun-burned or wind-burned.

It was certainly one or the other.

The unmistakable outline of my sunglasses, used for both brightness and protection from quickly traveling sand and dirt, could be clearly traced on my face as if I'd been out sunbathing by the beach. Until sand pits used for long jump are accompanied by waves and ocean however, I don't think beach quite covers it.

Beaches call for leisurely reads, quiet bits of noise masked by waves, reclining with a cold drink and a sun hat. Instead, I was on my feet for a 13 hour day, feverishly reading off my heat sheets, yelling at students and listening to my radio as we searched for athletes that were missing from their events.

And they weren't the only thing missing.

Also missing? My gloves. I carry them religiously during track season and yesterday afternoon they were gone. I pulled out my handy-dandy "keep in the car for any cold situation" pair, but I am still quite curious on where they went.

Thankfully, the rain was missing. This morning I woke up to soaked pavement and a steady mist. Though the wind that slowed down every athlete on the homestretch appears to be a bit lighter this morning, I wouldn't trade it for rain. 400 teenagers + steady rain + over four hour track meet = bad news. I'll pass, thanks.

I was also missing my brothers soccer game, which was being played simultaneously. Last week's meet also coincided with a game, and my mom (still ever supportive of all of her children's athletic endeavors) showed up from one to the other, ready to help me run the second half of the meet while she warmed up from two hours on a chilly set of bleachers.

And last (but not least), I am now missing a beautiful red couch. Turns out my busy schedule, which prevented me from picking up a craigslist couch until today, also prevented me from getting said couch. I don't blame the guy for turning me down for a better offer, but if I'd only had a moment's free time to pick up the most recent object of furniture interest--it would have been mine.

Yes, we all make sacrifices for the activities we love. Perhaps it's important to have those conflicting emotions; after all, they cause me to constantly question where and how I spend my time. What is a season of track worth: a burned face? a pair of gloves? a red couch? my brother's soccer game?

Because I have to choose, I believe I am aware of everything that I have, even if I am also aware of what I am missing. And I know that missing it makes me appreciate it that much more.

Round 2

2011-04-26T10:50:00.000-08:00

Today finds me back on our track hosting a meet after a local opponent's track failed to rid itself of snow and ice over the weekend. The sun is currently drying the rain soaked surface; I am hopeful that a return of showers will wait until this evening, and the wind will be kind to our faces. Even in dreary exhausting weather I appreciate a few mandatory hours outside. It makes me feel a bit more relaxed, even if I do so surrounded by hundreds of teenagers.

Tonight? I fully expect exhaustion, but at this point I can make it: three weeks of track and four weeks of school is all that stands between me and a summer break.

I will be ready.

Unexpected Gifts

2011-04-21T22:24:00.001-08:00

It was a cold afternoon on the track. The predicted rain and snow, shown on the weather forecast for the past ten days, didn't show, but the chill in the air reminded everyone outside that we were not fully finished with winter.

And yet, it is spring. The track meet today, the first outside event of the season, proved that we don't wait for weather in this town--the show goes on.

Today's meet was hosted by yours truly, an added project that has caused grading and planning to stack up neglected, my typically meticulous desk space to grow quite unorganized, and my list of daily to-do's to multiply exponentially. Yes, today was the culmination of much planning. Even as the meet played out amidst flaws (timer batteries that die in the middle of the 1600?) and forgetfulness (bullhorns, anyone?), it rolled by fairly smoothly and showed how much support I have in this community that I joined only eight months ago.

After all, if I can convince people other than immediate family to join me out in frigid wind to help corral and direct distractable teenagers, I have much for which I can be thankful: a supportive community, a lack of snow, and a whole weekend to catch up from this exhaustion.

Matching the Rhythm

2011-04-20T06:40:00.000-08:00

Remnants from a conference with a parent with many young children in tow...

A student returned to school today after an extended absence and struggled to acclimate to the changes. It’s hard to return to a rhythm when you have missed the escalation; the dance was slow when you left, and now it flows at a feverish pace.

It’s that time of year.

Emotions and attitudes have escalated, and all high and lows play out in dramatic fashion. This student didn’t expect everything to be so magnified, so extreme.

It’s not altogether unexpected, but it is exhausting.

This weekend was a welcome reprieve from the chaos. Content to attach myself to Curtis for 48 hours, I welcomed our less-than-efficient cleaning and grocery shopping, and embraced the generous napping and eating. He was coming off a week on nights. I was coming off another week. I doubted my ability to sleep a solid nine hours on Saturday night after three hours worth of naps during the day, but the sleep came easily, and I lingered in the quiet, welcoming a free moment to just exist.

Monday came too soon, as it often does, and the memories of biking in the sunlight, sauntering along on errands, and folding laundry over lazy conversation floated in the back of my memory as I attacked stacks of papers, practice and meet arrangements, and plans for the rest of the year. It seemed like I’d existed in another universe, just for the weekend, and like this student I reeled from the reality check I faced the moment I unlocked my classroom door.

Teaching is a spiritual experience for me, but at no time is this more present than at its conclusion. It is at this time that I am required to face a couple hard truths:
First, there is always more that could have been done, and I never could have time for all of it.
Second, the fruit of my labor, the impact of my daily forty-five minutes can never truly be measured—least of all by me in the midst of the toil.

Neither truth is easy to swallow, and reflecting on either exhausts me emotionally as I come to grips with the reality that the last day of the school year will be the last day I ever see or speak with many of my students. One day everything is finished, and I send them on to make something of themselves, to grow up, to mature, to become the person they will be.

And while that moment is fairly anti-climactic, surrounded with the pressure of posting grades, washing desks and filing paperwork, the build up to that moment leaves me perpetually nostalgic. And like it or now I find myself riding the extreme waves the students follow from day to day: glad to see you, can’t wait to see you go, glad to see you, can’t wait to see you go, glad to see you…will I ever see you again?

Craving the Tangible

2011-04-15T07:00:00.001-08:00

I found myself cooking swiss chard at 7:30 last night.
It was a last minute recipe find, a craving to make something, create something tangible. I have often found myself with a recurring urge for such things since I began teaching.

Teaching is a beautiful, messy labor that rarely leaves one with tangible results. Thus I find myself cooking, cleaning, quilting, and creating into the evenings to enjoy a few moments of working with my hands, pondering the quiet, and ending up with a finite, physical result: fruit from my labor.

There was little that made sense about the venture: making a pie crust after seven at night, enjoying a steaming slice of goodness after 8:30 while basking in the lingering sunlight coming through the window. I was secretly hoping that Curtis would call from the hospital to tell me that he wasn’t busy, that yes—he would love for me to bring a fresh, beautiful quiche to the hospital for him and his colleagues to enjoy as they head into another night of work.

But the phone call didn’t come.

Instead, I served myself one, then two pieces of pie, lingering over the steaming concoction and wondering why I don’t spend more time cooking and less time completing dull tasks like opening the mail and emptying the dishwasher and grading papers.

I suppose everything has its place, and my place has felt empty all week.

It doesn’t matter that I know that Curtis has been sleeping at home while I am away at work, our condo occupied more than usual as we exchange habitats within an hour or two of each other, flipping from our day to night shifts.
It doesn’t matter that dishes magically move from the sink to the dishwasher, from dishwasher to cupboard in my absence.
It doesn’t matter that I often find handwritten notes in our book awaiting my arrival after a long day of work, or that half the quiche will surely be gone when I get back this evening.

He has not been here. And even though evidence of our shared existence is a comfort, sometimes tangible is what you need.

Thank goodness the weekend has finally arrived.

Making a Case for Cold and Wet

2011-04-13T07:11:00.000-08:00

I paraded my wet, rank dirty shoes all around town Monday evening, even though I felt I carried a stench around with me everywhere I went. When I finally arrived home it was after nine at night and I’d been gone for fourteen hours. School, track, paperwork, workout, visit my sister, visit my husband, shower, bed. That is the ritual I follow from day to day during this season. And it’s invigorating and exhausting all at once.

So why the soaked shoes? Well, the athletes needed some…inspiration. The track was cold, and wet, and covered in slush and moose poop. When I’d finished my work with the hurdlers I started circling the track alongside several of them, encouraging them to keep working, to pick up the pace, to run. “You’re not as cold as we are,” they protested “not as wet. You just got here.”

So I have no credibility because I’m not cold and wet? I can fix that.

And with that I cut in from lane eight, where the track was mostly clear, to lane one where the thin ice cracked through to ice water and slush inches deep, splashing up my legs and onto my back as I continued, yelling back all along “Now? Now will you run?”

With that they joined me: splashing, running, chuckling as we continued around the backstretch, basking in the simplicity of running through puddles on a sunny—albeit cold—afternoon. And as we tracked back in the hallways after we’d finished, they ditched their shoes and left wet footprints of various sizes that gradually evaporated in the warmth of indoors. The stench of wet, dirty feet grew stronger as they piled in, and even though they complained, I couldn’t help but feel invigorated with the ice splashing activity.

Yes, it’s track season, and all wet, muddy, gross accessories that it brings.

It will all be over so quickly; I’ve coached too many seasons to think that it might linger. The meets and practices will run together as the school year comes to a close, and though one minute I am planning out events for our first meet, in the next I will be taking inventory of returned track jackets.

This will be my fourteenth track season and my fifth as a coach. Spring would not be spring without it. Even as my free time is quickly filled with the logistical planning and execution of practices and meets, I find myself slipping into autopilot, content to reappear into society in late May with a face two shades darker than the rest of my body from long days in the cold sunshine, and a pile of mud-stained gear that will never be quite the same.

Coaching is nothing if not consuming, but on days when splashing through puddles of ice wins over adolescent boys that rarely follow my lead, I notice much less that my schedule too has been won over by teenagers looking for guidance in a sport that I have long loved. And sometimes there is nothing more rewarding that remembering how much you love your job, even if it leaves you with soaked, smelly shoes that you have to put back on tomorrow.

Fighting for Spring

2011-04-09T08:20:00.000-08:00

I woke up every morning this week to find fresh snow on the ground. Sometimes a dusting, sometimes an inch, sometimes practically a frost, the ground seemed to be a daily reminder that the battle for spring was still raging. Yet with the temperatures breaking forty sometimes fifty on a daily basis, and a windstorm on Thursday blazing with gusts strong enough to knock down trees and cut off power, the snow is melting and disappearing slowly. The gutters that line the streets are overflowing with the accumulation from the melt, reminding drivers and bikers with every splash that even as the battle continues, the war will be won.

This time of year in the classroom seems to reflect the same, and the gray wintery skies are actually helpful in keeping large groups of teenagers content to be indoors, in the classroom, working. But even if the casual observer notes that everything appears to be “under control”, anyone tapped into the current running beneath the surface knows that there’s a strategic battle playing out on a daily basis.

“And who will win today?” I ask myself as I prepare my classroom in the morning.
The distraction of the weather?
An engaging, relevant lesson?
Variables and tensions at home outside of the student’s (or teacher’s) control?
The inevitable breakup of a two-week relationship?
The looming and nearing reality of a summer without ______________.

Indeed, the battle for spring seems to be the perfect embodiment of the battle fought in the classroom every day. Unfortunately, in the latter battle, there’s no predictable winner.

Local Legends and Truths

2011-04-06T00:09:00.000-08:00

In the past month I've done quite a bit of reading, which has been burdensome at times, but mostly a good excuse to curl up and enjoy quiet moments at home. The latest three books I've read are all about Alaska, but from very different angles.

First I completed "Last Letters From Attu". I read this in Mexico and the contrast of reading about long rural Alaskan winters while camped out by the pool in a swimsuit was not lost on me. This book tells the story of Etta Jones, an Alaskan pioneer that traveled in from the Midwest with her sister when they were both single and around forty years old. She married a local; her sister had enough after nine months. Over the next twenty years she lived in several villages working first as a nurse and eventually as an educator. Her appreciation for local Native Alaskan culture and her effort to integrate that in educational systems as she established them was very different from many educational philosophies of the time. When World War II hit she was in Attu with her husband, one of the only places in the United States to be invaded. Her husband was killed and she was taken as a prisoner of war to Japan for three years. Her story of is cataloged by both personal diaries and her avid letter writing throughout her adventures. While I read this book for a project I needed to present in a grad school class, I enjoyed the story thoroughly.

Second, I read the "text book" for that same class, "Conflicting Landscapes: American Schooling/Alaska Natives". It was co-written by the teacher of my class, who lived as an educator and Russian Orthodox priest in rural Alaska for over thirty years. His personal experience and knowledge of what federal mandates have done in shaping rural Alaskan schooling, and what is actually needed out there, is very interesting. I initially was frustrated with the required six credits that I had to take to get a permanent teaching license up here, but after taking this class I am convinced it is a valuable requirement. Whether I teach in rural Alaska or teach students from there, I will be a better teach if I understand the history and conflicts that these students are coming from.

Last, and following in the same theme, I read a book about Alaska that is fiction. This was the latest read for the book club I have been (somewhat) participating in, and given the class I took and the direction my thoughts were going, it was fitting. The author for this book was local and actually came to our meeting to discuss the book this past week. I enjoyed this book for both the way that it wove simultaneous stories in present time and through flashback, the use of traditional Native Alaskan stories (the author grew up and went back to teach in the rural Alaskan area this book is about), and the fact that it is about the struggles of teaching in a culture that is different than the one "setting the standards" for education. A fairly quick and easy read, this was a perfect "weekend" book to dive into when the slush and snow make outdoor activity of any kind mostly miserable. I would definitely recommend it, and can't wait until Curtis has time to read it (you know, sometime this summer when he is stuck in his own rural village).

Up next? The same book that was up next last time...and that I have barely moved on since then.

(Sorry, Ali. I'll finish it some day!)

Incognito

2011-04-03T09:35:00.000-08:00

I have often heard it said that one should not go to the grocery store while hungry. For me, the grocery-shopping caveat should be exhaustion. Somehow I regularly end up wandering the aisles with the attention span of a gnat and energy tank that has been sucked dry. I try to conjure recipes in my mind. I strain to remember anything that I regularly cook. And I fail.

Instead, I end up gathering miscellaneous materials to populate my fridge in hopes that I will no longer be disappointed every time I approach the kitchen with a growling stomach. I end up picking out two pieces of every type of fruit on sale, because I can’t decide which one makes the most sense. I end up running into miscellaneous displays of angel food cake and hair spray, all while trying not to run into the next person that unexpectedly stops within three feet of my cart.

I feel like I am six years old all over again, entrusted with control of the grocery cart only to blow it when I get distracted with a display of candy and run into my mom while she checks out the selection of yogurt. And then the cart is taken away.

There was no one to take the cart away from me tonight, however. I rounded corners and made impulsive decisions and continued to the check out with the goods I’d accumulated, mentally trying to concoct a dinner out of the ingredients. I kept half an eye out for a student, who would surely catch me in this lowly hour: half-asleep, half-confused, disheveled from track practice, and hair fluffy, frizzy and out of control.

This time I made it out without being spotted.

Last Friday, I was not so lucky. A student rounded the corner display of laundry detergent just as I was checking out; I ducked behind the tabloids to avoid being seen in my disheveled state. I was running the same disoriented grocery-shopping play: 9pm, exhausted, and starving.

And then, as I waited behind an older woman purchasing a large collection of frozen meals, I discovered that gathering staples at that hour has its perks: half-price rotisserie chickens. All of the sudden it didn’t matter that I was still nasty from working out after track practice, or that I hadn’t had dinner, or that I’d only had time to eat half my lunch, or that at least one of my students had seen me in this lethargic state.

I was getting one cheap chicken.

I didn’t eat a thing when I got home that night (well, except for a Samoa from the dwindling girl scout collection), but the trophy for my late night venture greeted me every morning for the next several days. I was victorious. And thankfully come Monday the student didn’t bring up the compromised teacher she’d spotted that Friday night.

It’s possible, I suppose, she didn’t even know it was me.

Unpredictable Variables

2011-03-31T20:40:00.000-08:00

A very small patch of green I scouted out last weekend near our condo. Needless to say it was gone this morning...

Yesterday was yet another valiant effort at spring: 50 degrees, mostly sunny, balmy as I walked out to my car in shorts and a t-shirt after practice. Never mind that the sidewalks were covered in snow and ice and slush (with a small lake forming toward one end of the parking lot), it felt like spring, an arctic version of it anyway.

And then today happened: Good morning, snow storm. How are you? The ice ruts that have been forming on our road with the freezing and thawing of slush were covered in an uneven, rugged blanket of white. Small flecks of white stuff hit the windshield as I drove to school, small flecks that turned into healthy flakes, accumulating on everything as I arrived on campus. It made it look a lot like......winter.

By the time it was 10am, the snow plow was clearing the sidewalk outside my classroom, adding more volume to the mounds of snow pushed into corners and along walls over the course of the season.

We were making such progress...and I feel like we have taken two giant steps backward.

I guess it's not all bad. The 5-9 inches that were supposed to show up today materialized as 2-3, and a look at the weather report shows renewed hope in springtime. Indeed, perhaps the fickle weather is taking a cue from the adolescents I hang out with on a daily basis: every day brings something unexpected. And yet, that is one of the reasons I have always loved my job in the first place. There is nothing mundane or predictable about walking into a classroom with thirty variables.

I suppose that means I should also love spring in Alaska. Because even though the weather report called for inches of snow when it is practically April, the forecast calls for mostly sunny tomorrow.

Full Palate

2011-03-30T11:00:00.000-08:00

Saturday:

I woke up before 7am this morning, without an alarm or other stimulus. My body knew it was time to get up--to do laundry, and dishes, and get moving on the day.

My counters are overflowing--with dishes, yogurt over its date, empty milk cartons and mashed potatoes from four weeks ago. I'm cleaning out the fridge, and then taking out the trash. And the trash stinks, let me tell you.

By 9am I am in my all-day grad school class, presenting my final project...

Sunday:

I woke up just after 8am this morning, and quickly calculated the time it would take to continue my quest to return the house to a semi "normal state". I folded yesterday's now-clean laundry. I finished what was left of the kitchen. I straightened. I put away. I left by 10:20am.

After church and lunch I am back out running errands: dropping off an old road bike to get tuned up for a May triathlon, returning studded bike tires that were deemed unnecessary for Curtis's bike commuting, purchasing materials to paint our second bedroom...all in heels and a skirt. The lady that waited in line behind me while I held 29" studded tires was trying not to chuckle aloud...so I turned and commented "I must look like quite the walking contradiction, wearing this outfit, carrying these tires. Have I lost all my outdoorsy credibility?"

She assured me I hadn't.

On my way home I updated Curtis, who was hard at work on overnight shift #2 of the weekend, on my progress. Turns out, he had zero patients and was contentedly watching my March Madness bracket fall apart while I ran around town being productive. I suppose there are some perks to being required to live at the hospital.

After a relaxed visit with Curtis, I was back home and hard at work taping, covering, moving and painting. With half the edging left, I headed to bed.

Monday:

By the time I left the house at 7:10am I felt behind. There were ever accumulating pieces of paper to deal with: track physicals and roster, papers to grade, outlines to critique, and track practice for 150 to plan indoors--all while sharing space with other extra-curricular activities.

Because of a few parents late to pick up their students, I didn't make it home until after 6--only to find myself in the midst of a mess left by my almost finished painting project. The weekend's cleaning frenzy seemed to be invisible when surrounded by paint cans and drop cloths. I felt discouraged.

Tuesday:

It has been a week since I've had a moment to compile any coherent thoughts, even as I jot down thoughts and observations as I go about my day. When I don't have time to write, I feel like I don't have time to process...I am just running around aimlessly, accomplishing whatever arbitrary goals have been set for me (or I've set for myself), checking items off the list and hoping they don't add up more quickly.

Today was just as busy: packing meals to eat on the go, teaching a full day, continuing on at practice, trying to squeeze in some personal exercise, and hitting the pillow with a list circling my head as I drift off to sleep. It looks a lot like tomorrow...and a lot like last week.

Some days I feel like I have to count down the 37 days of school in my head to convince myself that the energy reserves will last that long. Some days, 37 days does not feel like nearly enough to finish the school year off with everything I want to accomplish.

In the end, the busyness will ensure at least one thing: when the break for summer eventually arrives, I will be ready...for hours outside instead of under florescent lights, for projects that can linger and not be rushed, for meals that don't have to be stored in Tupperware and reheated in the microwave.

Until then, I hope I can enjoy this last push of chaos. As much as it is exhausting, there is still joy to be found and fruit to be enjoyed from the labor. Some days there is nothing more satisfying than a stack of folded laundry, an empty dishwasher, or the smell of fresh paint lingering in the evening.

Hypothetical Miles

2011-03-22T10:59:00.000-08:00

"On His Way", by Jean-Jacques Sempé on this week's cover of The New Yorker Magazine

The miniature cartoon man greeted me from his stationary bike as I sat down on mine. I have not always embraced mechanical contraptions for exercise, but when the weather in unpredictable and the sidewalk are littered with ice, I enjoy the predictability of a machine where I can close my eyes and zone out as the miles pass me by. Some days I could take it or leave it; other days I need the hamster wheel to think, work through ideas, burn off some steam. After an hour I can move on: go to the grocery store, run an errand, visit my sister, go home. And I can do all of it without wondering if I'm going to lose it when someone crosses my path.

Teaching often feels like a roller coaster. I'm twisting and turning, unsure of when things will slow down--let alone stop. Sometimes it feels glorious, and sometimes I just feel sick.

When the painting on the cover greeted me as I cranked up the resistance to settle in for an hour of methodical predictability, I quickly opened to the inside cover to find the title: "On His Way", it read.

I suppose.

Where am I on my way to?

I am on my way to reading a whole bunch of papers on "A Person That has Impacted History." Based on yesterday's questions, I'll be reading papers on everything from Metalica to Marilyn Monroe to Stalin to Wayne Gretzky to George Washington, who--as one student discovered while becoming momentarily confused--is different from George Washington Carver.

I am on my way to four nights of a grad school class, coupled with the first week of track and a full day of teaching.

I am on my way to another weekend of skiing, assuming this week's weather prediction for four days of snow comes through.

Indeed, me and the man on the cover of this week's New Yorker Magazine have much in common: an evening content to pound out hypothetical miles, because we both know that life moves on regardless of whether we make any physical progress during a workout.

Effort, Galoshes & Loosely Defined Progress

2011-03-18T07:07:00.001-08:00

It was a valiant effort, for spring that is. All week the temperatures have been hitting the mid-30’s, and it was written all over the vehicles. The puddles have been getting deeper, the slush more persistent, and everything has been covered in wet, muddy snowmelt.

And then today it snowed…almost all day.

There were already a few inches of accumulation when I left for work at 7am, Curtis’s footsteps from ninety minutes before nearly hidden on the walk outside the condo. And the snow continued as I drove to school, and as I peaked out the window between classes, and as I graded papers at the end of the day. By the time I left it was mostly clear, but the damage had been done: one fresh blanket of white coated the city.

Keep in mind we have a high of 38 for tomorrow, ensuring the yesterday’s puddles will double in size for tomorrow’s post-snow melt. And thus begins the annual rite-of-passage for summer that people in this town lovingly refer to as breakup: a month or so melting of all things frozen that turns the city into a dream for anyone that likes to clomp through mud with rubber galoshes, and a nightmare for anyone attempting to wear white before Memorial Day.

Yes, it was a solid effort, and a solid fail. And as long as that trend doesn’t follow suit in my classroom, I’ll go ahead and ignore the mud splattered pant legs and film covered car windows. After all, as long as the snow is melting we are making progress. Even if it keeps falling.

Illogical Musings

2011-03-17T06:44:00.000-08:00

Last night the sky was still awake with light when Curtis finished his studying around 8:30pm. Daylight savings may have caused our mornings to rewind into darkness, but the evenings have found me craving summer.

I see spring all over but outside these days. My friends in the Midwest talk of warmer temperatures. Pictures on the internet claim the coming of green. Sandals make their way into storefront displays. And yet I see snow and ice and a minus in front of the temperature in the morning.

I wanted to wear cropped pants to school this morning. With sandals. I felt like a child that was craving the totally illogical outfit while giving in to the measured, responsible choice. Then I saw one of my co-workers wearing cropped pants while on my way to lunch. I stopped. Did a double take. And walked up to inform her that I totally supported her decision.

Who cares if it's below zero if your calves are still tan from the spring break sun?

Perhaps tomorrow I will wear a dress. With no tights. And a pastel cardigan. Later I will sip lemonade on our balcony (while wearing my down coat).

Yesterday I went skiing, on groomed trails, with no sign of ground peaking through. I felt like a rebel, betraying my sandal cravings with every stride and turn.

Soon enough, spring will arrive. Soon enough, the track will be free of the thick blanket and the skis can be stored in the closet until next October. Soon enough, our daylight hours will dwarf the darkness and the stars will disappear for several weeks.

But for now there is snow in the forecast, closely followed by an appreciation for skiing in reasonable temperatures with abundant sunlight...even if it is just a handful of days before "spring".

Victory for the Home Team

2011-03-14T18:21:00.001-08:00

Sometimes Curtis and I play this game with our families....it's called "Try and Convince All Our Siblings To Move To Alaska To Be With Us". Before we lived here, our extended family from back home played it with us. This is how it works:

Tactic 1: Send text messages (often with pictures, for maximum effect) whenever "the family" (minus absent member(s)) is doing really fun things like eating out at local places, attending sporting events, or participating in traditional rituals.

Tactic 2: Make comments whenever absent members are visiting about how great it would be if we could hang out/do things like this ALL THE TIME.

Tactic 3: Try and find job opportunities for absent members to convince them that surely the set-up up here would be better than where they are at.

Now obviously some of this is done in jest, and we all recognize that there are totally legitimate reasons why our siblings may live in other areas of the country. With that said, this month we are celebrating victory. My entire family will all be living in the same city for the first time since 2001 once my sister arrives back in the homeland to start her new job at the end of the month.

Obviously Alaska is not perfect, especially since mid-March looks JUST LIKE mid-January, and is so far from spring it's not even funny. And yet, there is no place like home.

Catching Up

2011-03-13T16:55:00.000-08:00

After flying in from spring break 2011 after midnight this morning, today has been spent restoring order: grocery shopping, chili making, laundry washing, luggage unpacking. Our weekends are often spent like this, trying to make sense of messes that accumulate in weeks full of activities so that we are ready to face another round.

Tomorrow starts fresh for both Curtis and me. I start fourth quarter, with track beginning the following week. He starts a new eight week rotation, with new duties and lessons and patients. It's hard to believe that in just over two months the school year will be over, and that Curtis will have finished his first year of residency is just over three.

As the old adage states, time flies.

And believing that to be true on this sunny Sunday afternoon, I am going to get back to folding towels and putting away my passport rather than day dreaming about a satisfying week of relaxation. I am hopeful that I can record my memories from my spring break adventures very soon while holding a cup of hot tea rather than staring at a pile of wet laundry needing to be hung...especially when I am secretly wishing the laundry was wet with salt water from a round of chasing waves.

I Am Not the Maid

2011-03-01T19:16:00.000-09:00

Taken near the museum, one of many weeknight adventures taken while Curtis was working nights...

Curtis has been working for 23 days straight now, on the weekends, through the nights, and has only complained once. He has weathered busy patient loads, the hospital switching to a completely new electronic system and missing all sorts of social events. Some would say it’s “what he signed up for”. Some would argue that “it’ll all be worth it in the end”. Yet the reality is that when you’re in the thick of it, exhausted, overwhelmed, and deprived of all balanced, it’s hard to see through the moment.

For both of us.

Despite this crazy streak, we reached a significant milestone yesterday: the end of night shifts. As much as I’d like to think that the nights at the hospital are gone forever, the reality is that this hiatus will last for about three weeks. At this point I’ll take it. I would take one week, because with him on nights and me on days I start to feel like the maid: I fold the clothes; I stock the towels and the fridge; I leave mints on the pillow.

Well, maybe not that last part.

I’m ready to be on the same schedule, when my eight-hour days happen at the same time as his 12-15 hour shifts, rather than opposite of them. I am ready to have someone to share meals with, so I am inspired to eat something other than cereal or leftover mashed potatoes for dinner. I am ready to retire "the book" for a while, rather than paging through it like the latest hot novel.

I am ready to have him back.

I know that it won’t be a lot of time, and that he’ll still get held over, and that time together is limited. I will take it. It’s better than no time together, with no chance or hope to connect. This stretch of Curtis’s career won’t last forever, but gathering moments of balance in the midst of it is still crucial. And that is why I celebrate small victories: weeks without night shifts, a weekend off, an evening together. Because on nights like tonight, when he texts me as I am scheming about dinner to let me know he is “Going to be LATE tonight” (emphasis his), I have to remind myself that there is tomorrow. We’ll try this play again, and see if we can’t make it work.

It has to work eventually.

Night at the Museum

2011-02-27T14:25:00.000-09:00

Last weekend I put on a well-worn (hypothetical) hat and returned to the classroom as a student. I found out a year ago when I started to research moving my teaching license across the country that the move would necessitate such a return, and here I was, eleven months later, putting in my time so that the state of Alaska would allow me to continue hanging out with adolescents on a daily basis.

In addition to the obligatory 45 hours of class time, which for the sake of the professionals taking the class is packed into two weekends rather than over fifteen weeks, the students are required to go on a couple field trips on our own time. The first? A trip to our local museum.

I can only remember one trip to the museum in all the time I lived here growing up, but this happened to be my second time in two months. Last month when I made the outing I went with a couple friends from work to see a special exhibit. This time I went to see the general collection--and I wasn't disappointed.

The state requires all licensed teachers to take at least one class about Alaskan culture and history, which seems appropriate given the unique nature of both the people and places up here. While there were sections of the museum dedicated to both Alaskan artists, and those that have captured Alaska with their artwork, there were also sections dedicated to the relics and culture of the original Native Alaskan tribes who have walked a delicate line between preservation and assimilation in the past 250 years.

Glass case after glass case showcased clothing, tools, and artifacts from a lifestyle that seems like it existed ages ago rather than while my great grandparents were alive. Videos showcased native speakers sharing the challenges of trying to maintain a language and traditions even as the world they live in changes so quickly. It was obvious that the temperature, humidity and lighting in the room was intentionally controlled--yet one more way the breakdown of these symbols of communities is desperately trying to be fought.

As I continued to circulate the cases and exhibits, mostly alone in my evening perusal, I couldn't help but wonder what will represent this time in which we currently life. What artifacts will be valued and preserved? What traditions and values will be lost--for better or for worse? Try as we might to preserve pieces of our past, we are constantly moving forward and changing. Eventually this "modern-day-era" will be left behind for something else, and remnants of this age will be gathered as mementos of a time left behind.

There is something sobering about recognizing that I am one small piece of a story that is so much bigger and longer than I can often comprehend. This world has existed long before now, and will continue to turn long after I am gone. Perhaps this is why the museum is so enchanting, because it reminds me--if few ways that our current culture does--that I am not the center of the universe and that the true value in life lies in truth that transcends time or individuals.

And I guess that's one of many reasons that I am glad I'm returning to my status as a student for the next couple weeks. It may eat up a bit of my free time, but it also reminds me to think beyond grading papers and making dinner and all the other every-day-life necessities that quickly consume my thinking if I allow it.

Next up on the list of field trips? An outdoor adventure. I'll keep you posted, but suffice it to say I'm glad it does not involve snow caves.

Good Thing

2011-02-22T22:06:00.000-09:00

On Thursday, I will do laundry. I will gather the random piles of clothes throughout the room, evidence of a weekend of condensed grad school classes, night shifts, basketball games near and far, and days of conferences preceding it.

On Thursday, I will do dishes. The lunch Tupperware and salad bowls and muffin tins and tea strainers are accumulating in piles, begging to be dealt with and yet able to wait a moment, a day longer.

Yesterday? I was on vacation, which I spent gathering a couple hours with Curtis before he went to work and then driving seven hours round trip to my brother's basketball game.

Today? I squeezed in a workout before Bible Study and yet another basketball game.

Tomorrow? I have sewing group. Yes, a sewing group. Don't worry, there are two other 20-something in this group, along with the mom of one of our best high school friends (who unfortunately is out of state).

And so it all waits for Thursday.

Good thing there is enough random food to stave off a trip to the grocery store. Who needs an organized meal when you have yogurt, and blueberry muffins, and granola, and leftover mashed potatoes?

Also a good thing? Soup and salad day at school for lunch tomorrow...provided by people other than myself.

For now I will ignore the piles forming in favor of a good night's sleep and good time with friends. I'm pretty confident it will all still be there in a couple days.

The Book

2011-02-20T09:58:00.000-09:00

When Curtis graduated from medical school, we received a lot of wonderful cards and gifts from friends. With a move close on the horizon, we cherished the well-wishing sentiments and memories, often tearing up as we remembered the special relationships we had built in our time in the Midwest.

In the midst of our stack of memories was a small gift from a couple that lived down the street from us. A couple years older, we had known these two from college classes, from medical school, and eventually as our neighbors. The wife, two years ahead of Curtis in the same medical school, offered advice and a listening ear on classes and loaned him books, while the husband would invite us for dinner and humorously dialogue with me the ridiculous schedule that our spouses carried—all while validating the frustration and loneliness I often battled in the midst of it.

So what did this couple give us? A journal. In a thoughtful card they noted that they had begun to write love notes back and forth in a journal when the residency schedule took over their time, and cut into any opportunity to connect and share face to face.

Turns out they knew what they were talking about.

We don’t use the book all the time, but this past week has been a book week. Curtis finished week two of four without a single day off, not to mention some nights. We normally leave each other notes for all sorts of reasons: notes about dentist bills, notes about schedules, notes about groceries and anything else. When I wait to tell him information face to face, it can days or weeks until the conversation happens.

Thankfully, that’s not what this book is for.

This book is for all the things I think about when I fall asleep without him. It’s for the stories I want to tell him the minute I get home but am afraid I will forget by the time we actually sit down for a conversation. It's for the gaps I notice in his absence, and the plans I look forward to for when he is finally home. This book makes me feel like we are a bit more connected…even when we go days without being in the same space.

Someday we will probably rely less on a book to communicate with one another. Curtis won’t be working 80+ hours a week, and our shifts won’t cross over one another in ways that mean we go days without face to face contact. Someday I think I will enjoy looking back through this book, happy to have a record of thoughts we had to record on paper if we wanted to share them at all.

Until then, I will pull out colorful pens, and try to record a small bit of what happens in his absence, hopeful that a new note will be waiting when I get home, after he has vacated our home once again.

Evasive Hope

2011-02-17T21:33:00.000-09:00

The morning sky this past weekend, not quite the florescent scene we experienced today...

This morning I stood outside and watched the sunrise, just like I did yesterday. I have been appreciating the addition of daylight this week as I drive to work parallel with the mountains. The night sky has taken the slightest glow lately, allowing me to barely make out the towering silhouette against the sky. This slight light at 7:00am as I drive to work brings a sunrise around 8:30...just as first period comes to life.

We've continued progressing through The Outsiders in class this week, moving along as we get to know the characters, are surprised by the tragedies, and consider their conflicts in light of personal circumstances. We have continued to have conversations about life and learning, about choices and consequences. Today and yesterday, however, we were studying a poem that Ponyboy quotes as he watches the sunrise with his friend Johnny. At this point in the story they are fugitives, running from the law for crimes committed in self-defense. Ponyboy comments that so many beautiful things in life fade as quickly as they come, much like the sunrise.

Despite the single digit morning temperatures, I took my morning classes out to watch the mountains bathed in the pink hues as the sky came to life. We bothered to gather our coats, inform the security personal, and chance a total loss in control and focus so that we could "practice" the act that our narrator was talking about--holding onto the moments in life that are "gold".

We didn't stay out long, only long enough to soak in the beauty, briefly discuss the relevance of the activity, and rush inside before everyone began to freeze. As we spent the period dissecting and analyzing the poem it was apparent that the mountain-gazing exercise was comfortable for some while foreign for others. Some students totally connected with the elusive side of nature, while others just stared at me, silently begging me to just give them the answers so they could be done with the tortuous exercise.

Spring is starting to feel like a distant hope these days. We see the sun a bit longer everyday, and while the snow will be around for another two months at least, it won't be around forever. Eventually, the trees will come to life. Eventually, our nights will all but cease to exist. Eventually, the school year will come to an end. And as I approach this point in time, I already find myself becoming nostalgic with the reality that there are many students that I currently teach that I may never see again. And when that truth settles on my mind, the urgency to share so much with them makes me ponder what they will truly remember when they walk away from my classroom for good.

I hope that they remember this day. I hope they remember when we took the time to appreciate the beauty of creation, which despite its elusive moments of beauty will always come back around. There is hope in the daily sunrise and the annual spring, even though it sometimes feels fleeting. That is a lesson worth remembering, all the days of your life.

Seven Years Later...

2011-02-14T20:10:00.000-09:00

Seven years ago I went out to a movie with several friends. The movie? Miracle: the latest greatest inspirational sports film, complete with Aerosmith, goose bumps and reliving the best of American sports.

But I was hardly paying attention to any of it, because I was sitting next to Curtis.

I had already had my eye on Curtis for over a year, and while we had become good friends over the 3+ semesters we had been at the same college, I had little indication that he was remotely interested in me. We attended the same practices, travelled to the same meets, and even ended up in a couple of the same classes…but that didn’t exactly make us soul mates.

And then there was (a) miracle.

The movie outing, though taking place on Valentines Day, was merely the reality of a weekend off: no traveling, no racing, just time to act like normal college students. And like said students, several of us searched out the cheap movie theater for the latest showing of a past-prime film and followed it up with a nice Italian dinner—at Fazoli’s, the fast-food Italian chain.

In that theater, some time after Team USA was chosen and before they won the Olympics, Curtis gathered my hand in his and held it for the rest of the film. Later we talked, and word got out that the Alaskans were dating, but for that moment I was elated to know that my feelings were reciprocated, even if it happened to occur on February 14.

I’m just not that person.

Despite my dislike for romantic cliches, on Valentine’s Day I started dating a man that I am now married to. It started with sly hand-holding in a dark movie theater, and progressed as we waded through medical school applications, my complicated perspective on marriage due to my parent’s divorce, potential post-graduation options and locations, residency applications, match day, and then a cross country move.

February 14th represents so much more than an obligatory card or gift, it marks one more year that we have worked and developed our relationship. It marks one more year of stories and victories and losses. It is the anniversary of our relationship, as cliché as it may be.

I consistently struggle with the balance between appreciating anniversaries and holidays as an opportunity to remember, and getting frustrated with how cheesy and superficial they can be. I don’t want my relationship—with its depth and history and meaning—to be confused with that of my students, which finds them sneaking kisses in the hallway today and sneering across the classroom tomorrow. Yet, in spite of this potential confusion, I will not sacrifice an occasion to mark my continuing marriage because it happens to fall on the day that carnations and candy will be handed out to a myriad of students for $1 apiece.

I don’t need carnations, or candy, or a holiday marked on the calendar to appreciate a man that has added so much joy to my life. I don’t need anymore than a handwritten letter, left by the front door for me to find when I get home from work, evidence that Curtis was home resting for his night shift while I was out working all day.

Last night as we lay in bed trying to sleep we kept getting caught up in conversation. It was day seven of twenty-six that Curtis working in a row, and we were trying to catch up on the last week as well as coordinate plans for the future one. Attempts to schedule a date night were proving to be over a month in the future, and while we had fun discussing where we might dine and what we might do, we gave up on nailing down a specific day.

No, I don’t need much on this anniversary of sorts; I have been blessed with one more year with my favorite person. And that is better than all the bouquets that sat in the main office, all the candy the students sneakily ate throughout the day, and any candle lit dinner—today or a month from now.

Choosing Carefully

2011-02-12T09:38:00.000-09:00

A small selection of the foot apparel at yesterday's dance...

I had a good talk yesterday with my kids; you know, those students I am paid to hang out with on a daily basis. While the last three weeks have been consumed with structured, academic style writing, we finally got to transition from our research project to a novel.

The Outsiders is definitely a book about choices. Some situations in life are handed to you; some situations are the direct result of the choices made in life. I had a student ask me the other day why we were allowed to read this book. “It has smoking and drinking and gangs and fights; the school is okay with this?”

Yes, because it also has truth.

The book isn’t a picture of what we wish high school was like, or what we wanted high school to look like. The book is a reflection of the author’s true feelings about social classes, high school cliques and gangs, and the difficult situations that are handed to teenagers by their parents. And these situations strike pretty close to home for some of the students that sit in my class every day.

So what exactly were we talking about yesterday? Being guilty by association. In this day and age social networking is easy and available to anyone and everyone. It’s easy to broadcast your feelings to the world. It’s also easy to broadcast pictures of where you go, who you hang out with, what you do while you’re together. Facebook doesn’t discriminate between appropriate and incriminating pictures, but your future employer might.

“Besides,” I remind them, “What do you want to be known for?”

I started to talk to them about the decisions I make, living in a town when it is very likely I will run into a student or parent just about anywhere. Personally, I don’t want to ever be embarrassed by a situation I might find myself in if I were to be confronted with one of them.

Granted, there are times when I try to avoid running into students. I don’t exactly love it when they are across the restaurant while I’m out on a date with Curtis, and I’m not totally thrilled when I’m in sweatpants at the grocery store and I spy them further down the aisle. But wanting space to myself aside, it still matters to me that my students see me as a role model—whether I am in or out of the classroom.

The students had a lot of questions after I opened up this can of worms, mostly about what organizations and businesses are legally allowed to take into consideration when they accept or reject you. In a lot of ways they were very good questions, ones that our society grapples with more and more as social media further pervades our everyday life. Despite the questions, the message I was trying to get across to them doesn’t change: You need to decide who you want to be for yourself, because the choices you make determine who you are.

We will keep working through this book for the next couple weeks, and as we get to know the characters better, we will see them grapple with consequences for their actions—both positive and negative. I hope that today’s conversation was the beginning of them choosing more carefully—who they spend time with, what they spend their time doing, even what they post on Facebook. Because as much as they’d like to think their teenage years won’t affect who they are as adults, they are choosing who they will be come a little more every day.

Recent Reads

2011-02-09T00:01:00.001-09:00

Last year I read a blog post where the author listed all the books she had read in 2009. Every last book, organized by genre, was briefly dissected and reviewed both for personal records and for the good of anyone looking over her shoulder, anxious for a thought-provoking or feel-good or informative read. I felt personally inspired to keep a log of my own reading, both because I'm curious and because I can't always remember the good ones to recommend later, but I didn't do anything about it. Then came the end of 2010, another blog post where author listed and dissected, and I still had no list.

2011: This is the year.

I figure the key to keeping such a list is to start early. While I'd like to have some organized system of book listing (by month, or every other month, or something to that effect), this is a totally random post approximately one third of the way through February. When will the next book post be? Your guess is as good as mine. So without further ado, here are the first three reads of 2011:

Great House: Nicole Krauss

In the interest of not boring those that don't enjoy reading (or teach it for a living, as the case may be), I will sum this book up by saying that it is a web of stories. Krauss earned my affections when I read "The History of Love" in the summer of 2009 (which is not as chick-lit, cheesy as the title makes it out to be); her voice in writing is enchanting. Her characters are quirky and interesting, and her use of multiple first person narrators keeps things interesting, and rarely obvious. I would compare the book (loosely) to a show like Lost (which is a personal favorite): the characters are a part of a web of connections that they themselves are not completely aware of, and that you as the reader get to discover. I would recommend Krauss as a writer any day of the week.

Point Omega: Don Delillo

This book made it on to my stack thanks indirectly to my boss. A book club was started at my school in the late fall, and this book was slated as the read for February's meeting. I did not vote for this book, would not have chosen this book, and read it because I am the student that feared showing up to class without my homework completed. I was (am?) quite sure it was (is?) a poor reflection of myself. Personal insecurities aside, I practically read the entire book the day of the book club meeting. How? It's only 120 pages, double spaced. For anyone that's read Delillo, this book fits. It's vague and philisophical and ends up where things started with little progress. I read part of "White Noise" in college as part of a Modern American Literature course and while his dark dreary statements about modern society are interesting, his stories lack the color I like to see in my reading. Maybe I'll start reading Delillo once every six years to stay current. That's really my only motivation to return to his writing.

The Outsiders: S. E. Hinton

Through some tragedy in my middle school career, or so I'm told, I am just now reading this book. This may or may not have anything to do with the fact that I am teaching it, starting this week. With both this book and the above option looming over my head this weekend I opted for this one every time. The characters are fresh, the conflicts make me cringe, and it was written by a sixteen year old in the 60's. As I read it I find myself daydreaming about Mustangs and students that write beautiful published novels. As a teacher that knows that my students face some of the devastating situations in this book, I actually get somewhat depressed while I read it. The novel is about brokenness, and classism, and following social rules because the rules have always been followed. I hope that my students get sucked into the book the way I have, because I think there's a lot of potential.

That's it for now on "Book List 2011". Next up on the list?

Freedom: Jonathan Franzen

I'm about 60 pages in, and I'll keep you posted.

Restful Satisfaction, or Loving a Hot Breakfast

2011-02-07T00:01:00.003-09:00

On weekends when Curtis is not working, I often crave a nice hot breakfast. It’s not that I’m particularly hungry for a salty, sweet pairing of pancakes and eggs, or the light, fluffy texture of blueberry muffins, or even the overly sweet delicious cinnamon rolls. No, when I want to make breakfast it is because I want to feel relaxed and able to spend twenty minutes or an hour preparing our first meal, not in a rush to go somewhere or do something. I want to have something other than oatmeal in a Tupperware that I consume at my desk while checking my email and organizing papers for the day.

I want to feel at rest.

Some weekends I feel like the “rest” factor is compromised for ever necessary “productivity”. This Saturday it wasn’t. A leisurely pancake breakfast led to a couple hours of waxing skis. Lunch turned into reading and eventually a nap. Soon enough we made it out skiing, and watched as the sky turned from daylight to sunset, with vibrant colors radiating off the sky and the snow and the ocean. We talked, we laughed, we fell, we skied past other late-afternoon patrons and past moose just off the trail. When we finished, we were tired, but it was a good kind of tired, much like after you’ve laughed too hard for too long and are intoxicated with satisfaction.

And then we went home.

The evening wrapped up with enchilada preparation (for Sunday’s Superbowl party) and a last minute invitation to friends to come over and play games. Given that they are Curtis’s co-workers, the discussion was not absent of jokes about medical terminology, even while they all mused about how wonderful it is to have a day off.

Eventually we went to bed and fell asleep, satisfied with a full day. After all, on Sunday we found ourselves with a bit more of a full schedule with church, squeezing in a ski, and circulating through parties hosted by friends and family. On Sundays I can often get a bit somber, recognizing that Curtis doesn’t have another day off for two weeks, frustrated that time together until then may very well be spent in the hospital when he’s not busy but still expected to be there.

And on those days I will still make a hot breakfast, wrap it up, and bring it to him (and his team) at work, a good excuse to visit him for a bit and win points with his coworkers. Because let’s be honest, homemade baked goods are always a welcome alternative to the hospital cafeteria, even if they aren’t accompanied by a leisurely day at play.

Conflicted

2011-02-04T16:30:00.000-09:00

"Today was the pinnacle of my professional satisfaction," Curtis proclaimed to me upon returning home Wednesday, after I'd spent a day slogging through frustration. I'd already spent several minutes ranting about my research paper woes, in response to his innocent, loaded question, "So, how was your day?"

I laughed.

I suppose it's good that my day of semi-crippling lows in the classroom was countered by the perfection he found in his own. We are ever amazed by the similarities in our professions. I try to lead students through activities to teach them important skills. He tries to lead patients through procedures and habits that will save or improve their health. Unfortunately, both of us find our audience uninterested or reluctant to hear what we have to say--let alone act on it.

Today was far from the pinnacle of my professional satisfaction, but it was an improvement. The reluctance of yesterday's students to format bibliographies and create interesting introductions and conclusions was met with focus in today's students. They were quiet. They were making progress. They were asking questions.

So what changed? Well, there was a band field trip that took out a third of my class, leaving me with a quaint collection of twenty students in my morning class. It's amazing how much more manageable twenty students feels when you perpetually are overloaded with thirty...or more. The funny part about this was that Curtis had identified numbers as the number one reason his day on Wednesday had been so satisfying: a lone three patients were in his care. This is a far cry from the typical ten, or the dreaded twenty, and allowed him to invest generous amounts of time to planning and executing care.

Given this revelation, how do I feel about the announcement from the local school board that in response to the budget crisis, middle school sports will be saved while my classroom will be stuffed a bit more full? The answer: rather conflicted. I love sports, both participating in them as a student and an adult and connecting through my students through coaching them. Unfortunately, when I'm faced with the reality of choosing an increasing class size in order to keep that activity, I question the depth of its merit.

What good is an after school connection if I can hardly keep up with each of my students as it is? And yet, perhaps that's why we need to save those extra curricular activities now more than ever. If I can hardly connect with them now, what will happen if that after school connection is eliminated?

It's finally the weekend, and while I left my grading at school, the questions of student learning lingers in my mind as I put away groceries, as I go out for an evening ski, as I make social plans. Will they finish their work? Will their parents ask them about it? What will they have in their hands on Monday?

I don't know. And while I've told Curtis too many times to count that my job (and his) would be infinitely easier if I didn't care, I do.

I care a lot.

Slush and Such

2011-02-02T19:31:00.000-09:00

Today was a slogging kind of day.
Slogging through the fresh blanket of snow that turned to slush when the temperature hit the mid-thirties.
Slogging through research papers at school, where absences and laziness have left some students on step two of the process while the rest of the class is on step five.
Slogging through my lunch break when a handful of students come in for extra help, when all I can think about is the students that should be there, but aren't.
Slogging through three loads of laundry.

It's just feeling like a really long week.

The good news? Curtis doesn't have to work this weekend, a welcome break after two thirty hour shifts last weekend.

The bad news? We still have two days of school left, and despite the intense storm that is giving my comrades in Ohio a couple of snow days, here there is no inclement weather in site.

And so I press forward: through the slush, through the research papers, through the laundry.

Sometimes, you just have to keep moving, knowing that it will all end--eventually. After all, when you hang out in the slush too long, you just end up soaked, salty and gross.

And then all you end up with more laundry.

Menagerie

2011-01-28T00:01:00.000-09:00

That is the word I came up with when pressed to decide what spelling bees and quilting have in common. They were both on my mind as I went about my evening: paying the bills, searching for Curtis's W2's, emptying my breakfast and lunch tupperwares from my school bag.

Tomorrow is the classroom round of the junior high spelling bee, and I had words on my mind as I went about my business: curmudgeon, Kelvin, jalapeno, yeti, legalese, convivial...and then that morphed into my visions of my latest quilt planning. I spread the fabric on the floor yesterday, and then sat and placed each scrap or yard into piles of different colors, an irregular crayon box that had enough order to look intentional, and enough eclectic options to make any artist drool.

And it was in that moment that I convinced myself that quilting and spelling bees are not so different. Both are collections of items that have something in common, even as they are infinitely different. They follow rules, and have structure and form, and yet can be collected together in ways that are beautiful and ugly and interesting and boring and awe-inspiring.

Now, I am off to work on assembly of my own...

Simply a Good Day

2011-01-26T00:01:00.000-09:00

The tunnel leading down into an old World War II bunker in Curtis's hometown.
It all started in the hallway.

I was standing outside my door, watching the students pass between periods: classroom-locker-chat-locker-classroom. Then a student walked up to me and asked me a question: Can I chew gum in your class?

Now this answer has changed in the past year. At my last school, gum was not allowed. That's not to say that the stealth teenagers didn't try to sneak it every opportunity they got, it's just that when I heard it, saw it, smelled it, I asked them to spit it out.

At this school, gum is up to the discretion of the the teacher. Knowing that trying to outlaw gum in a school where my students likely chew in every other room was an uphill battle, I told the students they could chew as much as they wanted--until it became a distraction. If I saw it or heard it, it was gone.

And that's what I reminded this student, slightly surprised that he still didn't know the policy after our five months together. On the other hand, that fits this student. He's not very great at paying attention, and doesn't often notice details. He's not the most mature, and capitalizes on every possible opportunity to elicit a laugh. As a result, he's gotten in his fair share of trouble.

If there were a mature student in the 8th grade, it wouldn't be him.

Despite all of these realities, I humored him when he pulled out a pack of gum and I saw it was Trident Layers--one of my personal favorites.
"That's a good pack of gum," I commented to him as we stood together in the hallway.
Without missing a beat, he quickly replied, "You want some?" as if I was one of his buddies, and we were sharing a bag of chips.
"Thanks for the offer" I told him "But I don't like to chew gum when I'm talking in front of everyone." He smiled and nodded hid head, and headed back into the classroom while I corraled the stragglers into the classroom before the bell.

Toward the end of the period, when I finally made it back to my desk, I found a piece of gum neatly placed in the middle of my computer keyboard. It was a small gift, stealthily placed, and never mentioned.

And it made my day.

There are a lot of up and down moments in teaching, almost like I am plucking petals off a daisy daily. The petals proclaim "they love me; they love me not" depending on how much they love my lesson, hate the assignment, are getting along with their friends, or parents or relatives. I deal with a lot of variables, very few of which I have any control over. I care a lot for my students, but I am rarely convinced they have any idea.

One piece of gum? A token, a gift, a small act that made the day a little brighter.

I'll take it--any day.

Salad-Du-(Every)-Jour

2011-01-24T19:45:00.000-09:00

Every Wednesday the school I work at has a “soup and salad” luncheon. Various teachers throughout the school volunteer a couple weeks a semester to bring soup or salad for forty, and the other weeks that teacher gets to feast on someone else’s crockpot creation or fresh greens.

It’s a welcome mid-week break.

Last week was my turn to bring lunch, and I purchased the fixings for one gigantic salad. I opted to make the same creation I made first semester (blue cheese, pear, and Dijon oil vinegar dressing), and purchased the same amount of materials.

The problem? Apparently people are more hungry in October than January. Perhaps the other dishes were more appetizing; maybe serving an autumn fruit in the dead of winter was uncouth. Whatever the reason, the lunch period came and went and the second half of my salad never needed to be prepared.

Curtis and I have never been good at throwing things out. Whether it is the running shoes he wore in junior high (that I would love to trash) or the unappetizing leftovers (that I can’t take for lunch for the 17th day in a row), we are people that believe in using everything—especially food.

When I came home that day with a mountain of salad fixings, Curtis wasn’t overly dismayed. He loves salad. When I showed him that I had already purchased extra lettuce (in addition to the leftovers) for salad fixings, he added that we’d have to get creative.

After all, the clock was ticking.

We are on day five of the massive-salad-construction-project, and have made several lovely creations. The classic blue cheese and pear on Wednesday (for both lunch and dinner) morphed into blue cheese and apple on Friday, which was a nice change up from the taco salad consumed on Thursday for dinner and Friday for lunch. Over the weekend we continued trying to work through the massive pile of greens, with today’s salad-du-jour being one with salmon, avocado, tomato, cilantro and feta.

Yes, necessity is the mother of invention (or a new appreciation for allrecipes.com, depending on how you look at it).

As would be expected, the greens are slowly starting to wilt, and we are down to our last eight cups. It’s anyone’s guess as to whether we will consume the greens before they need to be tossed. This much is clear, however: we gave it our best fight. If we lose, we will have done so struggling against the decomposition process until the bitter end.

And our vitamin and mineral levels will be all the better because of it.

A Bit of Blah

2011-01-22T09:06:00.000-09:00

Fake drama, anyone? Part of snow-cave-adventure-weekend was a staged avalanche survival exercise. Trying to follow along as a bunch of medical professionals "saved" victims made be more than aware of my lack of knowledge about the human body.

Good thing I know exactly how to use a semicolon.

We hit our stride this week, after an unusual few weeks that involved Christmas break, travels, snow cave construction and a four week rotation requiring Curtis to work only 40-50 hours a week.

We almost felt like a normal couple.

The weather seemed to echo our own experiences, bouncing back to reasonable temperatures (above ten degrees, or even zero) and granting us the first fresh coat of snow in nearly a month. The last month of extreme cold and unseasonable warmth settled on a typical neutral.

And so did the hours of our schedules.

For some reason that I can't explain, January and February seem to be "a bit of blah" (as I explained it to my friend) every year. Things are a bit too routine, with not a lot of excitement to keep life feeling new and fresh. School has been in session for five months, but it's not stopping anytime soon. The winter is beautiful, but has been around for a while. The darkness is receeding, but not fast enough.

Subsequently, I sometimes find myself moving from task to task with an underlying feeling of "blah" that makes grading papers a bit more aggravating, laundry a bit more bothersome, and cleaning and tidying a task to be perpetually put off.

The good news? We are near the end of January. So this "blah" stage is about half over.

The bad news? Third quarter means one thing for me as an English teacher: research papers. My mind in constantly littered with thoughts and plans for teaching website credibility, proper academic writing structure, and endlessly trying to come up with a system that will help my students not lose things.

I'm pretty sure that keeping track of notes, sources and a pencil all at once is the number one problem.

In the mean time, we'll attempt to spice things up with skis on the fresh snow, cinnamon rolls for weekend breakfast, and reading books for fun (gasp!) at the local coffee shop.

(All while finishing the laundry and putting things away, of course.)

Looking for a new start...

2011-01-17T07:37:00.000-09:00

In addition to humans, Curtis is also great at bringing fires to life...

It has been cold the past several days. Really cold. It didn't break zero degrees at our house all weekend, and when we drove to church around 10am Sunday morning it was -16. Thanks to these superbly chilling temperatures, one of our vehicles hasn't been starting so well. Or at all.

One of the best things about our latest residence is that we have one garage slot. The problem is we have two vehicles: one a shiny, new specimen that I picked out in 48 hours last summer when an unexpected collision left us without our trusty Honda Civic; the second a tried and true suburban that was purchased when my brother was born. Have I mentioned that my brother is in high school? This is the truck I learned to drive in, the truck I slid through red lights in on icy nights in high school, the truck that we took road trips in when I was a child.

While one of our vehicles starts like a charm, even when left outside all day in below zero temperatures while we live in snow caves, the other, well, let's just say she is not a huge fan of sub-zero temperatures. Whenever the temperature gets really cold, the old 'burb needs a jump start--sometimes a really long one.

Sunday morning Curtis went out to start the 'burb to give it a bit of a warm up and found it to be unwilling to cooperate. The engine would turn over a little, but the fluids were frozen or something and the vehicle would not be persuaded to come to life. After over an hour of connection to our young, perky car, the old lady would still not come to life, and Curtis set out for the local auto parts store for some inspiration.

When he returned he was in possession of all sorts of toxic chemicals intended to provide the jump start we needed in our frigid temperatures, which were still below zero--even in the heat of what was now afternooon. Every so often I would get a call from Curtis up to where I was in our warm condo, making chili and organizing tax documents, to come down and aid him in his latest method of reviving the 'burb. To no avail I revved both engines while he sprayed highly flammable contents on this fan or that gizmo, sucking the water out of the gas and trying to heat all sorts of important things.

(At one point the thought passed through my mind that as amateurs we might end up setting something {ourselves?} on fire with all these chemicals, and when it was all said and done I'm pretty sure the consensus would be that it wasn't worth it.)

Despite the flamable chemicals and the jump start from our newer, sleeker vehicle, we were left looking for new options. Perhaps, we theorized, if we could get the suburban into the garage to sit overnight, it would come back to life. After all, what woman doesn't love a nice spa treatment to feel revitalized? Curtis called his brother, who brought over a couple spare tires to help move the oversized vehicle into the coveted garage slot. I was once again beckoned into the cold, where I was given the important task of directing the vehicle into our slot and NOT into the neighbor's shiny SUV, all while battling a lack of power steering.

It was a very intense moment.

Once the suburban had been pushed and prodded into the warmth of the garage, we left her to sit while we ventured to my mom's house for dinner. Three hours later, we optimistically tried to start the warming vehicle to no avail. Apparently three hours wasn't enough to thaw out. This morning (a morning that I ironically should get to sleep in, since it's a school holiday) I woke at 6am when Curtis's alarm beckoned him out of bed. I lay in bed trying to "sleep" while I listened to him dress, scarf some breakfast and ready for the day. Then I strained my hearing for news from the garage two floors below--would the old lady come to life this morning?

The sound of our heating (working overtime in this frigid spell) was masking any sounds from the garage, and after ten minutes of pretending to sleep while everything in me was dying to know if the vehicle turned on I put on several layers to venture down to the garage in the -19 temperature of the morning.

No luck; apparently the spa treatment wasn't enough.

I climbed into the 'burb to turn the key several times while Curtis tried the flammable chemical concoction to no avail. And when it was obvious that a heated garage had not fixed the ancient vehicle, we closed up shop, disconnected the jumper cables, replaced the hoods, and jumped in our dependable vehicle so I could drop Curtis off at the hospital.

The vehicle still sits in our garage, and I will probably secretly sneak down to try my hand at coaxing the suburban into turning on this afternoon, mostly so that I can be the hero when Curtis gets home. What better way to show that a day off from school has been productive and worthwhile than to turn on the car with no assistance that he labored over for hours yesterday afternoon?

Meanwhile, I hope that a twelve hour shift at the hospital brings lots of productive life-saving measures for Curtis. Because even though he may be totally unknowledgeable at what makes automobiles tick, he has had way too much schooling on humans.

And sometimes, you just need a win.

(In)Vincible

2011-01-14T14:15:00.000-09:00

Did you know that "vinicible" is a word?

As I drove to work this morning, ever aware of my swollen achy hands (more on that later), I was trying to figure out what the opposite of invincible was. As in "I am so far from invincible, I am ______." And I couldn't find a word that I liked. Vulnerable? Conquerable? Breakable? Nothing seemed to fit the way I wanted it to, and I was left wondering if I could just ditch the "in" and call myself vincible.

Turns out I can.

I probably should have ditched the "in" yesterday afternoon around 3:08pm: one minute before Curtis called proclaiming he had gotten off early, twenty minutes before I changed into clothes to go out skiing, thirty minutes before I watched the temperature drop down to six degrees as we headed to the trails, forty-five minutes before I stopped at the top of a hill intensely frustrated because my wax was slow (due to both temperature and the need of a new coat) and my hands numb past my second knuckle.

I was feeling quite stubborn, however, and was determined to finish our normal loop. The wax issue continued to get worse, my hands continued to grow more painful, and about a mile from the parking lot I opted for a short cut that would let us cut off almost three quarters of a mile. Bad idea. Just as I was taking the short-cut-corner, I wiped out on a mini-ice rink sitting right in the middle of the trail. I bruised up my knee and shin, grunted an "I'm FINE" when Curtis turned around to check on my progress, and proceeded to the parking lot afraid to open my mouth for fear of what might come out.

Sometimes the trail and I don't get along.

This morning as I tried to think of a better word than vincible, I was feeling very aware of my weaknesses. Yesterday morning a couple students got in a fight a few feet from my classroom, a few minutes before the start of the day. It disturbed me. One of the students I have in class and know to be an intelligent and thoughtful person. Why stoop to a level of clawing at the other person's face? Yelling profanities as you get pulled away? I felt very aware of instances where emotions get the better of me, of all of us, and we make choices that are no longer logical or measured.

I have not thought myself to be invincible for a very long time; the older I get the more I am aware of how easily I can be conquered--by students, personal ambitions not attained, or really cold weather. And yet when I am surrounded every day with full classrooms of teenagers that act like they could conquer the world, I am often moved when they fall back down to earth. I want to hope that they can make it--out of family situations that drag them down, away from peer groups that might compromise their goals, into a world where their potential can be met.

Unfortunately, sometimes one is left the next morning with aching hands, a reminder that quickly made choices perhaps weren't very well thought out, wondering if there is something I could have done to keep the students from making negative choices of their own. And yet, the battle continues: in the classroom, on the trails, in my mind. Sometimes you have to keep fighting, despite the reality of brokenness, for the victories--even when they seem to be impossible to find.

Does continuing to fight for these wins despite all sorts of set-backs make me invincible after all? Maybe. And maybe hanging out with teenagers every day, who seem to never know when to quit, has some positive effects. After all, even when they fall hard, they keep trying, convinced (to a fault) that next time will work out better than the last.

Next Time You're Stranded in the Wilderness...

2011-01-12T08:30:00.000-09:00

While the snow cave adventure was clearly the keynote focus of a weekend titled "Wilderness Survival", there was a lot of information to be learned about making the best of being stranded in the wilderness. Though my readership probably doesn't plan on getting stuck in an area with no communication, transportation or people of any kind, you can never be "too prepared", as the following bits of info will surely convince you.

First off, there were many a lecture that started with "One thing you should always carry with you in your backpack is..." Clearly I need to get myself one of these backpacks. These things will literally save your life five times over. I'm not sure that my "leftover from college" pack is cool enough to carry all of the following gear. And if it is, I'm not sure I want to carry it with me everywhere I go. But maybe that's me taking my life into my own hands.

1. Flares: We practiced setting these suckers off under a clear night sky on a nicely frozen lake. A local "outdoorsy" store had donated a box full of expired flares of all shapes and sizes for us to set off--after letting the local authorities know that we were neither celebrating New Years Day a week lake, nor were we stranded with more than our fair share of attention-seeking devices. Lesson #1: Expired flares don't always work. Don't count on them in your hour of need--they might be duds. Lesson #2: Even when it's below zero, they may still catch things on fire. Luckily, our fire went out. Lesson #3: Make sure you have someone on hand that isn't afraid of explosives, fire or loud noises. Basically, I should never travel by myself in the wilderness.

2. Wire: After a twenty minute lecture on all the different ways to set traps with a certain type of wire (which I now, of course, can't remember) I am quite confident that if I were hungry enough, I might be able to construct something that resembled a trap to catch rabbits. Or mice. Or something. Being that I was listening to this lecture with a whole bunch of doctors, the mention of catching a rabbit led to a whole litany of diseases you could catch should you not properly remove "the innards" or cook the meat to a sufficient temperature, or skin it properly. Basically, as long as I'm carrying a backpack, I should also carry a meat thermometer to go with my wire. That, and wire cutters.

3. Knife: This one seemed obvious, but with Curtis and I were preparing for "Wilderness Survival Weekend", we realized we own no knife. We have knives to cook with, but nothing to take "to the wilderness" to use for things like peeling bark off of trees and fashioning mukluks--but I digress. The knife is necessary for obvious reasons. Apparently everyone should have one, and sharing one (like we did) might not be safe. What if we get separated?

4. Steel wool, a nine-volt battery, vaseline, flint, etc: Basically, bring something to start a fire with. I aided in starting a couple fires without matches, lighters and such and learned one very important thing: be ready to blow. A lot. I also learned that you have to get your face really close to the flame to keep it going, especially when it's below zero and everything you try to use for fuel is covered in frost.

5. Plastic bags, foam, carpet: Apparently these are things you can find in your everyday vehicle or plane (you know, for those of you that own one). I know where to get the carpet, and I'm sure I could dig up some foam under seats or something, but the plastic bags? What if you keep your car pretty clean? Perhaps this is where I blame my childhood for my inability to survive. If only I were allowed to leave plastic bags sitting around, I would have survived...but I digress. These materials are used to construct "mukluk" boots for the person that forgot a sturdy pair of boots or shoes and is now stranded. Basically you wrap the foam around the food, cover with bad, and then wrap carpet. It makes for a sturdy (albeit awkward) pair of shoes. An orthopedic surgeon helped me construct mine, and I was amazed at a) how talented he was at cutting the carpet to fit my foot b) the fact that he had two knives on hand for different uses and c) his knot tying abilities. I would personally recommend you keep a surgeon on hand for constructing these.

So, if you've been taking notes, items you need for "your backpack" include non-expired flares, wire, wire cutters, a meat thermometer, two knives, steel wool, a nine volt battery, vaseline, flint, plastic bags, foam, carpet and string. I would also recommend a surgeon, and someone not afraid of fire, explosives, or really loud noises. Put it all together in your (exceptionally large) backpack, along with a shovel and candles for snow cave construction, a sleeping bag for 0 degrees or below, and you should be good to go and get stranded in the wilderness.

Go get 'em, folks. Make sure to report back on how the rabbit turns out, and let me know if your own mukluks turn out nearly as stylish as mine:

Outside Adventures: Snow Cave Edition

2011-01-09T16:04:00.000-09:00

Taken from the inside of the cave...the best (though ineffective) impression of the compact space.

Ever since returning to our home state, Curtis and I have enjoyed exploring the terrain looking for adventure. Whether it’s crossing an icy stream while out mountain biking, or narrowly escaping a moose after (accidentally) crossing between a mom and its baby, we have been taking full advantage of the wilderness that exists almost right outside our front door.

This weekend we ventured almost two hours north with Curtis’s co-workers for some “wilderness survival training.” While public cabins were rented—cabins that lacked both plumbing and electricity--snow cave construction was part of the agenda.

I arrived on Friday evening, after a long week with my lovely junior high students, ready to conquer the wilderness. I had watched the car’s thermometer drop steadily since leaving school, from a balmy 18 to a not-so-comfortable 1. It didn’t help that I knew from previous experience that the car’s assessment of the outside temperature is usually optimistic. I put on almost every item of clothing I had brought along, and trekked a half mile down to our cabin on a narrow, winding, uneven trail carrying my virtually empty backpack.

Once we arrived at our cabin, the safe-haven in case of snow cave disaster, we dropped off my belongings and hiked another half mile to a different cabin where we would be eating dinner. We arrived just in time for snow cave awards.

The leader of the wilderness retreat had personally assessed all the caves constructed earlier that day, and was ready to report about his findings. One cave was deemed most aesthetically pleasing. Another was complimented for interior construction. And then the leader turned his attention to Curtis and complimented his design as likely yielding the warmest cave—due to the six foot tunnel that led to the compact, inside cave. “I hope your wife is not claustrophobic” he joked, while my eye brows jumped about six inches off my face and everyone chuckled.

“Did he forget?” I said while chuckling, eliciting further laughs from the crowd.

On the inside, I was terrified. I have long been uncomfortable in small, confined spaces—especially those without a quick escape. A six foot tunnel not even big enough to crawl through on my hands and knees, leading to a space three feet tall and six feet across? Not exactly my cup-of-tea.

Soon enough we ventured back to the cabin where I took my first look at the cave. Curtis was clearly pleased with his construction, but all I could think about was how small it was on the inside. How in the world was I going to relax enough to fall asleep? Once we settled in for the evening, I found myself more and more okay with the confined quarters. Despite the constant shower of ice shavings every time anyone touched the ceiling, a common mistake with such compact quarters, it was actually quite warm. Eventually I fell asleep.

That it, until I woke up screaming.

Turns out that even though I had convinced myself while awake that the snow cave was safe and secure, my sub-conscious was having nothing of it. After a very realistic nightmare that the snow cave was collapsing in on me, and anxiety that plagued me every time I started to fall asleep for the ninety minutes after that, I called it a night. I struggled to put all my layers back on, shimmied back out of the six foot tunnel dragging my sleeping pad and bag behind me, and ventured into an overly warm cabin to spend the night, getting up at two hour intervals to stoke the fire—lest the true survivors come in from the cold to find a cold cabin as well.

The next day when the snow cave was dismantled, I was unsurprised to find it incredibly secure. It took several people nearly ten minutes to break it down, and even when half the roof had been broken in, Curtis could still vigorously jump up and down on the other half. The ceiling was at least eighteen inches thick.

When we returned home Saturday evening after a long sequence of other survival activities, I told Curtis that I hoped he didn’t take my intense panic within the snow cave to be any reflection of the confidence I had in his constructing ability; the reality is that I just don't like small spaces. I guess we will just have to hope that we are never stranded in the winter wilderness. And if we are, I hope I quickly develop the ability to operate without sleep.

Even though I normally complete our outdoor adventures with a desire to repeat them at a later date, I think it is safe to say I never want to try and sleep in a snow cave ever again.

The destruction of the impetus of my anxiety...which gives you an idea of how strong (and deep) the cave actually was.