The Hazards of the Unforeseen

I'd ask whether life has ever handed you something you did not expect, but it would be a stupid question. Unless you are Nostradamus, it's happened today... or at least this week. My life is filled with the unexpected.

Right now my existence is permeated with it. I had eye surgery, which, unexpectedly to me but not to the eye doctor, it seems, meant I could drive in a week but would have to read large print EVERYTHING for the next 4-6 months.

My kids, only one month into school, have proven they cannot properly handle their classes without my constant nagging and looking over their shoulder. So they are behind. Again. And I have to refocus them ALL DAY to help them get caught back up.

My house is in need of its final overhaul, remodeling the last remaining ugliness. Unfortunately, that involves ripping down wallpaper and refinishing spots on the wood floor. The wallpaper alone has been a beast--the dining room alone took me FIVE DAYS to tackle.

I could whine more, but I won't. I just use these unexpected events as an excuse most of the time. An excuse not to write.

Not productive, I know. You don't have to tell me. Just as I don't have to remind you about all the unforeseen hiccups in your life. So, my vision still a bit blurry, I rip down wallpaper until my fingernails disappear, spackle, stretch my aching shoulders, and wait for NaNoWriMo.

Yet my hope is unchanged. I WILL get this remodeling done. I WILL see fine within the next few months (already I can write this without enlarging it on the screen, and that is GREAT news!). I WILL find a way to make sure my kids stay caught up AND still have time for my own pursuits. I WILL get my priorities back the way I want them, and not the way I have to place them for now.

This will pass. This is temporary. I WILL start my agent search very soon...

As soon as I get the last of this damn wallpaper down.

The Persistent Voice

I have three hours of Zumba today. I have to lug kids everywhere, shake, shake, shake all over the place to earn my income, dash to the store, do dishes, cook, tend to the house, get papers signed and faxed, and the list goes on.

Why am I still happy? Why do I have a cheesy grin on my face here, at the very start of the day, when no item has yet been crossed off? Because I also have a book waiting for me, the end of a novel I've been happily editing, a few good ideas to flesh it out, to make the climax nail-biting.

And I know, once I'm showered, once I've cleaned and fed everybody, that I'm sitting down here, at my beloved Mac, and working on it. That is the most beautiful thought I can imagine at this point.

More about that later. For now, it's off to make the kids' lunches!

Summer Goals

Over the last few summers I've posted a huge list of goals. Most of you know I'm the queen of lists. Even now I'm sitting at my laptop, glancing over at my list book as I write, considering the list for today.

But I just can't make a list for this summer. I know, generally, what I want to accomplish. I want to get my fourth novel finished, revise my first, second, and third novels and get them ready for sending out to agents, and revise my most recent play (which I just finished last week).

Really, though, I just have one big goal: WRITE.

I hope to write every single day. One blog entry and one hour of writing each day minimum. Bigger goals won't be accomplished without the smaller, daily task of writing. The big goals, at this point, look too big. It's rather like weight loss. If I only set my sights on the final goal weight, then that means every single day I remind myself how far I am from that goal. But if I just concentrate on exercising and eating right today, I have a chance to eventually make it to that goal, mainly by my daily action.

So I'm off. My lofty goals drift around, yes, but they are not the plan. The plan is just for today, the last day my kids are in school. I hope to spend the afternoon writing. How about you?

Serenity Wanted

Enchanted Oak, one of my current favorite blogs, wrote a review about a book I really need to read right now.

True to form, my son had a rough day at school--on his second day of school. According to his progress sheet, which is sent home every day with comments, and which a parent needs to read and sign, he played around and talked at his desk, completed almost none of his work, and so on. He had a rough day all around, for I had to take him out of school early so that he could get a shot to complete a series and be formally admitted into school. And I actually had to pull him off a doorjamb and hold him down so that the nurse could give him the shot.

I have never had to do this before. Even now, as I sit in my hotel room, my stomach churns in dread over how he is likely behaving in the classroom at this very moment.

You know the old saying, "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change those I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."

My wisdom is severely lacking. I can't change his behavior once my son is at school. He seems bent on doing whatever he wants to, and a bad mood makes his behavior even worse. But is there something about his mood that I can help to change? Is there a way I am contributing to his moodiness, or his attitude, or his behavior?

Or do I need to accept this as something I cannot change? Is this a place where I need to find serenity, to accept my son as he is and allow the school to deal with his behavior on their own, let him accept the consequences of his actions, and just take care of me without the tinglings of dread I feel each morning? Do I just make it clear to my son that I love him, and hope he finds his own path to happiness?

Any advice? I know many of you are parents, and many of you have much older kids... perhaps you can give me insight and perspective I don't have at this point.

New Beginnings

Despite not having ANY of the required documents to enroll, my children started school here in Georgia, 2,795 miles from where we lived only a week ago. (The required shot records are still processing at the health department, and all of the other identifying documents are in our moving pods... which won't be delivered until our house closes... which was supposed to happen Dec. 30th... which didn't... but which should happen by the end of January.)

School supplies in hand (in grocery bags), the kids took a tour with us parents, looking over the library, the lunchroom (which also serves breakfast), the music room, and their own classrooms. Each child went happily into a new room, with a new smily teacher, a new group of students, a new chance to make friends and do fun things and otherwise not be bored.

The hubby seemed pretty impressed with the kids this morning, and so was I. But I couldn't talk about it as we walked out the door without them. He kept asking me what I was thinking, but each time I opened my mouth my eyes teared up. What if they weren't okay? What if someone was mean to them? What if they were unhappy?

Then again, plenty of kids had been mean at their last school. And I can count a large number of times they came home unhappy, or disappointed, or hurt. But they went back the next morning, as cheery and hopeful as if they'd won the lottery, and school was a big treat.

Today was no exception. Today they had the treat of getting to go to school. So they smiled, hopped up and down, and even did a little happy dance in the hotel on the way to the car.

Amazing how a little optimism can brighten a day, and though I'm still feeling a bit choky, their smiles comforted me as the hours past.

Now if I could just get over my own motherliness... and perhaps approach the day with the same optimism?

Dreaded Bugs

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! Why is my life such a train wreck?!?

I was just about to put my kids to bed for the night, just about to settle in for an evening of grading my beloved essays (from all four classes I'm teaching), when my child shocked me out of my complacent plans. Leaning over the sink, she reached behind her head and scratched. Hard. Like she was really digging. Like it was really itchy.

My stomach could not have lurched more, but I tried to remain outwardly calm. I fiddled through her head one way, then the other. Little bits of...dandruff? Sugar? Oh, but they were stuck to her hair like sugar. I had to pull them off with my fingernails. 

Knowing the truth already (and if you've had this happen, you know the truth, too), I ventured further down, towards the neck. And I cursed (inwardly), for there were the creepy little almost unseeable bugs. Dammit! 

Now, don't get me wrong, there is not a time in my life when lice will be welcome. Not on my kids. Not on me. Not on my husband. Not on a flea in the front yard. If there is a creature that does not deserve to live, it's that one. But right now? I don't have the time! I have papers to grade! Rough drafts to scribble all over! Homework to help my kids with! Reading to do! Classes to plan for! Weekly grades to submit! I am OVERWHELMED with my life already!

Richard ran off to get the pesticide (and, yes, I realize I'm poisoning my kids--they'll probably die of brain cancer someday and it will be ALL MY FAULT), and I started washing bedding in hot water. We soaked all the brushes, cleaned all the stuff we could find, collected everything that couldn't be washed and vacuumed it (spraying it with some more pesticide, too, so that my kids could get cancer somewhere else), and washed everybody. I used the little nit comb and went through everyone's hair systematically. 

Everything seemed fine. Had it worked? I checked my daughter's hair this morning--the only person I'd seen signs of lice on--and she seemed good. Hair looked clean. Didn't see a single nit.

I should have been relieved. I did actually get some grading done. But then the nurse called. It seems all the bugs were gone (though she did tell me what I'd used was a pesticide, and it was not recommended, without telling me how else I was supposed to kill the creepy bugs), but she said my daughter's hair was "filled with nits," and to get rid of them, I was going to have to "go through Crystal's hair strand by strand, physically pulling off every one to get rid of them."

Great. Now, instead of grading papers, I'm FREAKING OUT! And tonight, instead of working on my classes as I should, I'm going to spend, oh, FOUR HOURS combing through people's hair! And my husband's going to have to spend the whole evening combing through mine once the kids go to bed. 

And I get to do it all with an itchy head, because whether I have them or not, even if I dosed myself with the cancer-causing pesticide last night and killed all the crawling ones, I'm itching from the mere idea of them. 

The nurse wished me luck. I don't think that's enough to pull me through this one. 

Summer Break Starts NOW!

I have no idea how it will end up, or what will happen, but four weeks of training is over. And my daughter's last day of school is today. And my son is now prepping for kindergarten. So, in less than five hours, we all have SUMMER BREAK!!! 

Hurray!

What will I do with my summer? I don't know. I have a ton of blank canvases waiting to be painted, including a HUGE one I bought for my sister and brother-in-law. I am working on revising my full-length play Desdemona. I need to work on two more novels, too, and do most of the research for my ghost book, along with planning out an entire fantasy series based on my first novel (which will be shredded in the process). My hubby's halfway through putting up a swing set in the back yard. Zumba classes continue at the YMCA, and I've started cardio kickboxing, too. My piano beckons every day, and I hope to sew a ton, too. I figure I'll fill the days nicely, even teaching my daughter to sew and letting her paint when I do. I'm excited about the prospects, about the relaxation, about having nothing but a little work to get done every week, since most of my jobs are ended. 

I do have some prep for fall classes to do (including reading through about four to five textbooks), but I also have a ton of reading waiting on me. I also have an 11-day camping trip planned, along with a quick (and long overdue) jaunt to my sister's in Houston.

What are all of you planning this summer? Will it be same as usual, or do you have an adventure on the docket?

Your Favorite Teacher

The training I'm involved with right now has sparked memories of some of my favorite teachers. I remember one, Ms. Cutuly, who used to stand on her desk, ready to jump off if we couldn't get a grammar question right. I remember a professor in my undergrad program who taught us everything so that we understood it well enough to teach it, since she knew most of us were future teachers. She had no attendance policy, yet no one ever wanted to miss a day, for we covered tremendous amounts of material in a single class period (no fluff movies and wasteful activities for her!). I remember a professor I visited in her office, to get her to sign me out of a course I'd taken at another school. By the end of the conversation, she was willing to sign the form, but I was determined to take the course again, with her. And I don't regret it, for it was one of the most useful classes I have ever taken (both times I took it!).

Honestly, most of the time school has been the place where I could fill my self-esteem and feel somewhat useful. At home I was overlooked and out of place, and I was often told I was unlikely to amount to a whole lot. At school, I had teachers who thought the world of me, who told me I could be anything, and I couldn't wait to get to school every day so that I could live in that world again, one where I was a SOMEBODY.

But I know my experiences are likely different than yours. What engaged you as a student? What teachers did you love, and why? If you've been waiting for a chance to respond that doesn't include poetry, here's your chance. What makes teachers great? What did you most need as a student, and how did they meet your needs, encourage learning, and make you feel respected and valuable? I'd love to know...