Playin Hookey

I'm kinda playing a little hookey today. Not really, but it feels like it. I'm "supposed" to be at a workshop for a math program today all day in town. I went to the morning session, but since I don't teach it, it just seemed like a waste of time to do the afternoon session. I got the concept of the program down very well and understand the philosophy and general process of how it's developmentally designed. It's excellent, actually, and I would HIGHLY recommend it -as well as the reading program workshop I attended all day on Monday.

But anyway, so at lunch break, I decided to make a clean break and come home to get some emails fired off and some other research done on my school districts. Next week I think I'll be taking a trip out to each of my schools and meeting the secretaries there, getting faculty lists, lists of important meetings, etc...kind of a "sneaky" way of gathering info and becoming familiar with districts before the staff workshop on Sept 1st. I'm a firm believer in research and "the more you know" (including "what you don't know CAN hurt you"), so quietly asking around and gathering info is kind of what I do well. Then I'll make sure my "radar" is opened up and running to catch any undercurrents I might want to be aware of at the same time. I learn TONS from impressions, intuition, and observation. That's been pretty true of me since I was a kid and I've only gotten better at it since I've gotten older. I think especially in the past 5 years. In fact, I'm going to go off on a tangent right now. For a while now, I've felt like a different person than who I used to be, though I still feel the same somewhat...but it's difficult to explain. When I reflect on my life, I see myself now as someone different than I used to be on the outside but not completely on the inside, and who I am right now was still me back then, but it was just a glimmer or like a light that was trying to get out from the inside when I was younger. Kinda like I was just living, going through the motions and either not very self-aware, or just not very aware period -or just had so much crap going on inside my head that there just wasn't room for anything else. But there was always that part of the "me now" that was always there then...but could never get out for whatever reason. It's like now I'm more authentic and more "me" -well, I'm definitely confident in that and like myself now -and what I don't like about myself I empower myself to change or allow myself to accept as a "just me" quirk or something, unapologetically. I'm not sure how I figured it out or what combination of things happened...but I suspect it was just a conglomeration of much reflection, decision making, very hard work, stubbornness, perseverance, and a gradual learning to just plain love myself for who I am that did it. So that's cool and all. And probably, if anyone ever asked me what my greatest accomplishment in the world so far was, I would say "I've learned to like myself, love myself and all my faults, understand myself and what I want out of life, am at peace with what I want compared with what other people/society may think is right for me, and I know I make the choice to be happy". But, i probably wouldn't because that kinda sounds pompous, right? -and that's soooo not my intent. But it's the God's honest truth. Yes, I've accomplished a GREAT deal in the last 10 years in my work with troubled, at-risk teenagers and affected so many kids positively and hopefully their lives are better and they feel better about themselves and know they are ok no matter where and what and who they come from...but the absolutely cool and completely unexpected thing I think that's come out of that has been my own personal greatest accomplishment. I only recently pieced that together in my head today reflecting on a conversation I had with a friend late last night.

So with all that heebie jeebie stuff comes trusting my instincts and I have some very good instincts about people. That's been very valuable for my in my work with troubled, at-risk teenagers -and for the most part I can open that up to adults and just "know" stuff. It works for my family and people I'm close to, and I don't like to admit that cuz now I know I've unnerved everyone. Sorry! It's impressions, people. Feelings... and feelings don't always have words or logic, so no harm, no foul. Like I always tried to teach my students, feelings are good and should always be allowed to be felt...it's what we DO with those feelings and how we take care of them that counts (i.e. anger management, self-injurious behavior, addictive tendencies, self-loathing...that's the kind of stuff I dealt with on a daily basis). I think also that's why I need time to decompress at home after long bouts with lots of people. Too much energy buzzing around & that needs to settle or I get VERY crabby. :-)

But anyway, full circle now to the beginning of the post. On my day of playing hookey, I am also planning on getting some stuff in my spare bedroom sorted out and put away. I want to sort out what books, etc I'm taking to my office and what I need to organize for here. My goal is to have everything sorted and settled by the beginning of the school year, Sept 8th. Good luck to me, huh? :-)