Leftovers

The holiday weekend is drawing to a close, and we've eaten our fill of turkey and dressing, a sweet potato casserole that could be served for dessert, rich side dishes, and pie piled high with whipped cream. So many calories in such a short time. Yum.
This has been a particularly satisfying season of gratitude. We've enjoyed beautiful seasonal weather, even color in the leaves. It's been my first fall semester of retirement and I love it. I've been to school a number of times to sub and each visit reinforces my belief that I made the right decision to retire when I did. It's great to keep up with the new and the young, but when your season is over, things just don't feel the same anymore. I'm too old school to be comfortable with everyone sitting around with a smartphone during class. All those kids eating lunch all over the school building, just feels like a cluster f^#k to me.
The holiday brought family together. I love watching Sloan being the big cousin with Molly, and seeing Grunc reading dinosaur books to Tyler. Sleeping with a grandchild is so satisfying. That little warm body that takes its half out of the middle of your bed is so peaceful, so completely relaxed and trusting in God and you and the Universe to guard her through the night. But the weekend also brought loss to a dear friend whose family endured the sudden termination of a much anticipated pregnancy. It is hard to find any way to be grateful for that kind of sadness.
Thanksgiving weekend brings out the best and worst in us. Filling food banks and our tummies, watching kids play and college football rivalries, starting wish lists for Santa and greedy lunatics storming Walmart stores for cheap TVs. It has all become part of our tradition. The leftovers will soon be used up, but the memories last and they don't take up any room in the fridge.

Thanksgiving 2014

My flock of turkeys came for Thanksgiving! I love it. Turkey defrosting pollution in the refrigerator. The crazy sleeping arrangements. Trying to fit the corn, sweet potatoes and green bean casserole all into the oven. It was practically perfect. Sloan even made place cards and decorated the tables.

Wine talks, cooking together, eating dressing and pumpkin pie in your fat pants. Family, football, fall foliage...all the ingredients for a wonderful holiday were in place. Everyone went home safely by Friday afternoon and I washed the tablecloth and wallowed on the couch. No wonder Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday.

Troubled Times

I'm a news junkie. There I've admitted I have a problem. That's step one, right?
The twenty-four hour news cycle was made for people like me. I wake up in the morning intending to meditate, but first I have to check in with a few media outlets to find out what happened while I was sleeping.
I've got to quit. The problems in the world have become overwhelming. AIDS and Alzheimer's, beheadings and Baghdad, cartels, drought, Ebola and education, Ferguson and the First Amendment, gay marriage and gun rights,  homelessness and Hamas, indictments and Iraq, jihadists, K Street lobbyists and killer cops, Libya, Midwest and Middle East, nuclear waste, Obama, Putin and polarized politics, questionable ethics, riots and refugees, starvation and Supreme Court rulings, Texas politicians, Ukraine, violence and volcanoes, water pollution and war, X-rated celebrity behavior and xenophobia, zero tolerance.
A steady diet of this negative vibe is adding to the sense that the world is going to Hell in a handbasket. My good Baptist raising tells me that God is trying to tell us something. My education tells me that history is trying to tell us something. The weather seems to be hinting at the need for humanity to pay attention.
Maybe it's not too much information, maybe it's a failure to process it in a way that brings about solutions to the problems. Maybe our intentions aren't what they should be and our goals are misguided. Albert Einstein knew that doing the same things over and over again, expecting different results was the definition of insanity.
I think the world is ready for step two.

Hair Condition

I think it may be time for a change of hair styles. I have an appointment with Billie the Miracle Worker this afternoon and I've got to make a decision. One of my style icons is a designer named Charlotte Moss, no not Kate's sister. She has the most wonderful hairstyle and I think it might work for me; I just can't make up my mind to do something that feels drastically different.
Yesterday I had to take my passport to prove citizenship at "guest teacher" orientation. The passport photo was made in 2009 when my hair was as long as I've ever worn it...that woman looks tired and old.
My hair is shorter now, but still essentially the same cut.
I showed Mother some pictures of the proposed new style. I needed for her to shout Eureka and validate my opinion. She just asked if it would be easier to keep. She did agree that I look better with shorter hair. My most truthful friend is in Colorado burying her mother, so she can't be disturbed with trivial life altering decisions. I have no where to turn. It is all on me to jump in with both feet and do this thing. I'm feeling up to an adventure, so this is going to have to be it. I'm doing it, I'm going extreme change...unless I change my mind between now and two o'clock.

New Normal

It is the Sunday before teachers go back to work in my former district. This has always been a day of high anxiety, great anticipation, and sadness for the end of another summer. I don't know how to feel today. I've got to figure out a new normal and let go of what has been.
This must be what bipolarity feels like. Having coffee on the patio this morning, I was relishing the freedom. I don't have inservice tomorrow! Minutes later, I was in my closet for something and realized this is the first time in my life I've never been school clothes shopping. I have NO NEW OUTFIT for the first day of school.
My FB friends who are teachers have begun to post their thoughts about returning to work. There have been first day ideas, essays about the importance of their coming work, and lamentations for vacations ending. I feel left out. Hooray! Left out of Eduphoria and signing up for dance duty and learning the names of 300 kids and that stupid advisory class.I don't have to watch the blood borne pathogens video or fill out the Starchart for the state of Texas.
I don't get to stand at the door and greet thirty eager faces at every class period. I don't have a key to room 2104. I'll never have another chance to be the teacher whose student made a perfect score on the AP United States Government and Politics exam. I won't see those hands stop writing and the attention come into the eyes of a classroom of students who have just heard you say something that has meaning for them. That moment when the light goes on and understanding occurs and learning is taking place.
Now come the tears. I need to morn the loss of a piece of who I am. I won't know the kids who check my groceries anymore. I won't be Ms. Bailey.
I'll be at breakfast with the ARSST girls when they have convocation at the Civic Center. I'll be able to go to Grandparents Day at Tyler's school. I'll be a "guest" teacher when someone needs a mental health day or jury duty. It will be a new normal.

Catching Up

I have been away from blogging for EVER! But, now that I'm retired, I plan to get back to jotting down a few things that I want to remember or share. I have taken to the pensioner's life like a duck to water. I used to wonder why my teacher friends who retired looked so much better when I'd see them. Now I know their beauty secret. They were just relaxed after so many years of stress and frustration.

The relaxation started with a trip to Galveston with the grands and their parents. It was a multi-generational event. We took Great-Gram to the beach too. We caught a huge break on the weather with the coolest July temperatures I can remember. The highs were barely 90 and with the shade and breezes on our wrap around balcony you could stay outside all day without breaking a sweat.

We all enjoyed the pool and it's a good thing we had it. The seaweed was piled higher and deeper all along the Texas coast and if that didn't put you off, the shark threat and flesh-eating bacteria would. Between climate change and deep water drilling, we've got ourselves a gigantic cesspool out there.

Galveston has been our only get away. The rest of the summer I've been doing what I always do in June and July. I've cleaned and organized. I need to put the house up for sale, potential buyers could open every closet without risk of harm from falling luggage. It feels so satisfying to clear out the clutter. Even the garage got the once over.

I've also been tutoring for mad money. The lovely Indian family that I worked for last summer called for American History for the youngest child, so I celebrated Independence Day with the Founding Fathers this year.

I feel free to engage in the public debate from a partisan perspective for the first time in years. So since I don't need to be neutral and keep my opinions out of the discussion outside the classroom, I've hit social media with whatever crosses my mind. Fellow retiree friend and I even went to
 the June meeting of Liberal Ladies Who Lunch. We loved it!

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like....

I've known that Christmas was going to be December 25 for quite some time. I know this on an intellectual level, but I can't get the rest of me to get with the program. I put up the dinky tree right after Thanksgiving on the one cold Saturday in November. I got out the Spode coffee mugs, a sure sign I have the holiday spirit, right? I'd rather drink my tea from my Target teacup...it holds more.
I have ordered exactly two Christmas gifts online. They were requests, so I didn't have to wrack my brain trying to think of the right something. But, now I do. The kids all have already bought whatever they think they might want, so there are no ideas there. Jeff and Jennifer said gift cards, when asked what they had on their wish lists. Bah Humbug. Gift cards are too easy and no fun to watch someone open.
I want to go back to the days when rosy cheeked kids scampered downstairs to find what Santa left under the tree. The excitement, the anticipation then was sheer delight. This just feels like an assignment.
I think I know what the problem is though. I don't get off work for the "winter break" until December 22. I still have to give and grade tests. Write a final exam and turn in textbooks. Not to mention all the make up work that needs to be given to kids who have been absent.
Today is my easy day. I only have two 90 minute classes and I'm finished right after lunch. As soon as I finish here, I'm bugging out for the mall. I'm going to put the carols on in the car and ratchet up my Christmas spirit, if it kills me! I'm going to buy something for everyone on my list that I think they will enjoy and that I will enjoy giving them. Then I'm going to stop at Starbuck's and get myself a gingerbread latte and head home to wrap up my packages.
School will take care of itself and my Dallas kids will be here on the 22nd. I have to get my priorities straight. HO, HO, HO!!!